NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, commander; left, Christina Koch, mission specialist; CSA (Canadian Space Agency) astronaut Jeremy Hansen, mission specialist; and NASA astronaut Victor Glover, Artemis II pilot, right, pose for a group photo after viewing the Orion spacecraft in the well deck of USS John P. Murtha, Saturday, April 11, 2026, in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of California. The quartet splashed down Friday, April 10.
Image credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls

More than 800 gigabytes of Artemis II lunar science data – some of it previously unreleased – was released today, posted to NASA’s Planetary Data System.

Most of the images from the mission were previously made public – although this Oct. 7 release is the official data archive with high resolution imagery and robust metadata.

Audio recordings

Other new material coming out includes the crew’s notes with annotated images, nearly a thousand new photos and videos from vehicle cameras, and more than 8.5 hours of audio recordings of the crew’s scientific observations from the lunar flyby.

In addition, a number of reports were issued, detailing lessons learned about integrating science into Mission Control.

Flash in the Pan…orama!

While not “moonbreaking” science results — those will come later with scientific publishing – there’s a treasure trove of Artemis II insights, including audio recordings of the four-person crew are as they observe the Moon, seeing flashes resulting from lunar impactors.

Interactive website

“The Artemis II Lunar Science Team is very proud to announce the release of an interactive multimedia web page exploring today’s release as well as three reports to accompany the data,” noted Kelsey Young, Artemis II Lunar Science Lead, on behalf of the Artemis II Lunar Science Team.

Image credit: NASA

Visit the interactive website at:

https://science.nasa.gov/feature/artemis-ii-preliminary-lunar-science-report/

Lunar science in this historic mission of Artemis II comes the first mission reports on crewed exploration of the Moon since the 1970’s, Young said.

A new beginning

“Our entire team put everything we had into not only the mission but in bringing these items to you today. Though our time as the active Lunar Science Team is ending, today marks a new beginning of you, the lunar community, being able to use the data to advance science discovery with this new tool in the planetary science toolbox,” said Young.

Data archives

The NASA Planetary Data System (PDS) announced the release of the data
archives from the Artemis II mission.

This release contains source, raw, processed, derived, browse, and document products from the
mission: crew handheld camera images, Orion vehicle camera images and video,
mission audio with transcripts and crew annotations, Orion storage locker
temperature and humidity data, mission documents, and SPICE kernels. The data
are archived at various PDS nodes.

Mission documents and Orion environment data at the Geosciences Node
Crew camera, Orion camera, and mission audio data at the Cartography and Imaging Sciences Node
SPICE data at the NAIF Node

The data may be accessed at:

https://pds-geosciences.wustl.edu/missions/artemis2/index.htm

Or for a bundle-oriented view:

https://pds.nasa.gov/datasearch/subscription-service/SS-20261007.shtml

Images acquired by the crew with the Apple iPhone 17 are not included in this delivery and will be archived at a later date, according to the PDS team.

 

Image credit: NASA

 

 

 

 

Check out these detailed reports and data user guide at:

ARTEMIS II PRELIMINARY LUNAR SCIENCE REPORT:

https://assets.science.nasa.gov/content/dam/science/missions/artemis/artemis-ii-prelimsci-report-/Artemis%20II_Preliminary%20Science%20Report.pdf?emrc=6ac65be823f3c

ARTEMIS II LUNAR SCIENCE DATA USER GUIDE:

https://assets.science.nasa.gov/content/dam/science/missions/artemis/artemis-ii-prelimsci-report-/artemis2_data_user_guide.pdf?emrc=6ac65be824bd8

ARTEMIS II LUNAR SCIENCE OPERATIONS REPORT:

https://assets.science.nasa.gov/content/dam/science/missions/artemis/artemis-ii-prelimsci-report-/Artemis%20II_Lunar%20Science%20Operations%20Report_2Oct2026.pdf?emrc=6ac65be8257dd

Image credit: NASA

Image credit: NASA

Image credit: NASA

Image credit: NASA

Image credit: NASA

Image credit: NASA

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