NASA RELEASES OVER 800GB OF ARTEMIS II MOON MISSION DATA

NASA has published more than 800 gigabytes of data from the Artemis II mission on a site called "Artemis II: Sights & Sounds of Science," the agency said this week. The release includes over 11,000 photographs and videos, more than 8.5 hours of audio, and crew-annotated images. Among the material is footage of the crew telling the ground team in Houston about impact flashes they observed on the dark side of the Moon, which NASA says could be among the faintest such flashes ever seen with the human eye. Alongside the archive, NASA released three supporting documents: the Artemis II Preliminary Lunar Science Report, the Artemis II Lunar Science Operations Report, and the Artemis II Lunar Science Data User Guide.

The Artemis II crew, astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen, flew past the Moon on 6 April, circling it for almost seven hours at around 4,000 miles (6,400km) from the lunar surface. Their observations, catalogued in NASA's 130-page Preliminary Lunar Science Report, describe seeing yellow, brown, green, blue and tan colours across volcanic plains and craters. The crew were particularly struck by the Aristarchus Plateau, a raised region on the Moon's near side known for its dense volcanic features, including dark lava deposits and coloured volcanic glass. Koch, the mission specialist, described the plateau as "a yellow snow-capped mountain" and "a jaundiced cheek of the Moon," pointing to its sunlight-reflecting craters. Glover, the pilot, said while photographing the region: "There are so many colours now... There's also a green. I see brown, especially Aristarchus and north toward the north pole."

NASA says the imagery and data could help inform decisions on future lunar landing and exploration sites, as space agencies work towards establishing a longer-term presence on the Moon. The agency has made the full dataset publicly available rather than releasing selected highlights. No further Artemis II data releases have been announced.