Artemis II toilet acts up as crew nears moon flyaround
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- The Artemis II toilet has been "hit-and-miss" since Wednesday's liftoff, with engineers suspecting ice is blocking the urine flush line in the Orion capsule; it remains usable for solid waste but not liquid.
- Mission Control instructed the four astronauts to fall back on backup urine collection bags, and NASA's Orion program deputy manager Debbie Korth confirmed the crew has reported a smell from the bathroom buried in the capsule floor.
- Mission management chair John Honeycutt called the commode "in a good state right now" but said he'd like it at 100%, adding that the astronauts "trained to manage through the situation" — a problem Korth noted has plagued space toilets since the shuttle era.
- The crew — Americans Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, and Christina Koch, and Canadian Jeremy Hansen — is set to reach the moon Monday for a fly-around photographing the lunar far side, the first crewed lunar mission in more than 53 years.
- The mission is poised to travel more than 252,000 miles (400,000 kilometers) from Earth, breaking the human distance record currently held by Apollo 13, before a Pacific splashdown on April 10.
- Koch and Glover are the first female and first Black astronauts to travel to the moon, respectively, while Hansen is the first non-U.S. citizen to fly to the moon, a milestone the Canadian Space Agency celebrated in a televised linkup from Quebec.
- NASA is eyeing the nearly 10-day mission as the first step toward a sustainable lunar base, with a crewed landing near the south pole targeted for 2028.
Why it matters: The toilet workaround adds operational friction to a mission already pushing 252,000 miles from Earth — farther than any crew has traveled. Engineers suspect ice blocking the flush line, but Monday's lunar fly-around still marks the first crewed moon trip in 53 years and a stepping stone to NASA's planned 2028 south-pole landing.
