The Orion capsule carrying the Artemis II astronauts has successfully splashed down off the coast of San Diego at 8:07PM Eastern time on April 10. It signals the conclusion of Artemis II’s 10-day journey around the moon, which is meant to be a test flight for a future mission that would bring humanity back to the lunar surface. The Orion crew module carrying the mission’s astronauts separated from the service module at 7:33 PM. While the service module was designed to burn up in the Earth’s atmosphere, the crew capsule was built to bring the astronauts back home safely. By 7:53 PM, Orion reached our planet’s upper atmosphere, where a six-minute communication blackout occurred due to the capsule heating up as it started its guided descent. The capsule has 11 parachutes, with its drogue parachutes being deployed at 23,400 feet to stabilize and slow it down. When Orion reached 5,400 feet above the ground, the drogue parachutes were cut off so that the three main parachutes could be deployed. That decreased the capsule’s velocity to 200 feet per second, enabling a safe splashdown. NASA’s engineers conducted several tests while the capsule was in the water before the recovery team headed to the capsule on inflatable boats to extract the crew from Orion. By 9:34 PM, all four crew members were out of the capsule. They were then hoisted into helicopters and flown to the USS John P. Murtha dock ship, where doctors will assess their health. Artemis II launched on April 1 with four astronauts on board: NASA’s Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch, as well as Canadian Space Agency’s Jeremy Hansen. They traveled around the moon for almost 10 days, reaching distances no other crewed mission has before it. The astronauts took photos of the far side of the moon , the side we don’t see from our planet, including amazing closeups of the lunar surface using their smartphones. That makes them the first humans to directly and personally view the lunar far side. During NASA’s post-splashdown news conference, the agency said it will announce the Artemis III crew soon. Artemis III will rendezvous with one or both commercial landers being developed by SpaceX and Blue Origin in low Earth orbit, which will take humans to the lunar surface. It will test the lander’s ability to dock with Orion before NASA lands humans on the moon again. Welcome home Reid, Victor, Christina, and Jeremy! 🫶 The Artemis II astronauts have splashed down at 8:07pm ET (0007 UTC April 11), bringing their historic 10-day mission around the Moon to an end. pic.twitter.com/1yjAgHEOYl — NASA (@NASA) April 11, 2026 This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/science/space/the-artemis-ii-astronauts-are-back-after-a-10-day-journey-around-the-moon-033800654.html?src=rss
Hi, friends! Welcome to Installer No. 123, your guide to the best and Verge-iest stuff in the world. (If you're new here, welcome, which Artemis photo did you make your wallpaper, and also you can read all the old editions at the Installer homepage.) This week, I've been reading about Sam Altman and Satoshi Nakamoto […]
Earlier this year, a relatively unknown startup from Finland made a startling announcement: It had finally solved solid-state batteries. Not only that, but Donut Lab, a spinoff of Verge Motorcycles, said that its solid-state battery - long considered the "Holy Grail of batteries" for their high-density, durable, fast-charging abilities - would go into production later […]
XChat is now on the App Store , where its listing says that it’s expected to be available for download on April 17. This isn’t the same IRC app from the early aughts, which you may remember if you’re of a certain age. This is a messaging app specifically for X users. X chief Elon Musk first talked about rolling out a new version of his social network’s direct messaging feature in mid-2025. In a series of posts back then, he said the new version would be encrypted and would feature a “whole new architecture.” He also said all X users were getting XChat in June last year, but Musk is pretty infamous for being overly optimistic about timelines. Now, instead of an upgraded DM feature on X, users are getting a standalone app. It allows them to chat with anybody on X and call each other across devices. The app is end-to-end encrypted and will let users edit and delete their messages for all participants in the conversation. It will also allow users to block screenshots and enable disappearing messages if they want the sensitive details they send in-chat to vanish within five minutes. The app allows users to create massive group chats with up to 481 members, as well. X promises in the App Store listing that XChat will not have ads and will not be tracking users. Users can now pre-order XChat for iPhones and iPads so that it automatically downloads on their device when it comes out. Your encrypted chats deserve their own app. Pre-order now: https://t.co/TM8Lk7AMGV pic.twitter.com/ZJ3yROXK1t — XChat (@chat) April 10, 2026 This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/apps/xs-messaging-app-xchat-may-be-available-soon-114722904.html?src=rss
