APTOPIX NASA Artemis Moonshot

In this image provided by NASA, the Artemis II crew captured this view as the Earth sets behind the Moon during a lunar flyby, Monday, April 6, 2026.

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Artemis II astronauts make long-distance call to the space station as they head home from the moon

Artemis II astronauts make long-distance call to the space station as they head home from the moon

The Artemis II astronauts are chatting it up with their friends aboard the International Space Station. Still aglow from their triumphant lunar flyby, the three Americans and one Canadian put in a call to their station colleagues Tuesday while heading home from the moon. It's the first such moonship-to-spaceship radio linkup ever. “We have been waiting for this like you can’t imagine,” the commander Reid Wiseman said. NASA's Apollo moonshots had no off-the-planet company back in the 1960s and 1970s. For Artemis II's Christina Koch and the station's Jessica Meir, it was a joyous space reunion despite being 230,000 miles apart. The two teamed up for the world's first all-female spacewalk in 2019.