NASA Astronaut Captures Artemis II Rocket at Launch Pad from the ISS

Picture credit score: Chris Williams
Astronaut Chris Williams was floating on board the Worldwide House Station when it flew over a well-known location, and he captured a photograph that throws the Artemis II mission into nice focus. The picture exhibits NASA Kennedy House Heart on Florida’s coast, the place the SLS rocket is now positioned on Launch Pad 39B.

Chris obtained the picture throughout a weekend go over the location, simply because the rocket completed its prolonged rollout from the Car Meeting Constructing. The drive to the pad had taken practically twelve hours on that massive crawler-transporter, which lined 4 miles. Because it turned out, the station was in precisely the right place in its orbit, giving him a transparent overhead view of all the coastal complicated.

The view exhibits the inexperienced marshes and streams sweeping over the panorama, framed by the blue Atlantic Ocean. There are roads and utilities scattered all through the realm, main to numerous pads. On the rightmost one, you’ll discover a shadow stretching away from the middle; this darkish type is attributable to the rocket and its launch tower. The rocket moved onto the pad on Saturday, January 17, 2026, and may launch as early as February sixth.

Picture credit score: NASA/Keegan Barber
Chris characterised the picture as removed from excellent, claiming he used the unsuitable lens, but it nonetheless turned out fairly particular to say the least. The rocket within the body will carry 4 colleagues, Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch, and Jeremy Hansen, on their mission across the Moon. That is the primary crewed mission to the Moon in over 50 years. And this time, they’ll be pushing farther away from Earth than any human has ever gone earlier than, then plunging again down at an unmatched tempo.

Picture credit score: NASA/Brandon Hancock
From 250 miles up, that scene on the bottom packs lots of engineering right into a single small shadow. Chris, the one US astronaut in orbit on the time of the crew change, captured the second when all of that {hardware} met the horizon. His coworkers will quickly be using off into deep house on that shadow, as he watches over them from above, passing by.
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