Artemis II crew receive Hawking Medal and reflect on moon flyby

Three members of the Artemis II crew have discussed receiving the Stephen Hawking Medal and reflected on their mission around the moon. Victor Glover, Jeremy Hansen and Reid Wiseman spoke at the Starmus Award Ceremony in Tenerife, where they received the medal. Christina Koch, the fourth crew member, was not with them.

The astronauts said the award meant a great deal and recognised their role as communicators. Glover said Stephen Hawking had fascinated him as a child and that the crew had tried to 'take a little slice of time and try to unite this world' during Artemis II. Hansen called the award humbling, noting that earlier recipients included Buzz Aldrin and saying the four astronauts represented an international team of tens of thousands of people.

The report described Artemis II as a 10-day crewed mission that took four astronauts on a journey around the moon and further than ever before on a lunar flyby. Glover said it was hard to single out one moment, but he highlighted flight day seven after the flyby. He recalled up-close science, Earthset and Earthrise, an eclipse, and a space-to-space call with colleagues on the International Space Station. He said the human story, from cleaning spoons after dinner to exercising and preparing sleeping bags, was as important as the scientific and exploration story.

Wiseman described the period around a 40-minute communications blackout. Just before contact was lost, Glover said, 'for those of you on the Earth and around the Earth, we love you from the moon.' Wiseman said the phrase acknowledged people in low Earth orbit. He described the crew as the four furthest humans away, disconnected from Earth and immersed in the universe. When Earth came back into view, the crew re-established contact through the Canberra Deep Space Network in Australia, and Koch welcomed Earth back to the Integrity spacecraft.

Glover also spoke about photographs from the mission. He said he does not stare at them often because he does not want them to become common, but one picture stands out: an unposed shot of Koch concentrating while working at a computer device. He said it captured an authentic human moment. Other crew members took pictures of the Milky Way and other scenes, he added.