NASA Sets 8:07 p.m. ET as Artemis II Splashdown Time

NASA’s Orion crew is on its final descent toward Earth, with ground teams fine‑tuning the re‑entry and recovery sequence for a Friday evening splashdown. The agency has locked in 8:07 p.m. Eastern (5:07 p.m. Pacific) on April 10 as the moment the capsule will touch down in the Pacific, likely within 100 miles of the San Diego coastline.

Re‑Entry Sequence

• 7:37 p.m. ET – Orion executes a brief burn to orient for re‑entry.
• 7:53 p.m. ET – The spacecraft pierces the upper atmosphere at roughly 24,000 mph.
• 8:03 p.m. ET – Drogue parachutes deploy at 22,000 ft.
• 8:04 p.m. ET – Three main parachutes unfurl at 6,000 ft, slowing the capsule to about 17 mph.
• 8:07 p.m. ET – Splashdown in the Pacific, followed by recovery by the Navy’s amphibious transport dock USS John P. Murtha.

NASA has been broadcasting daily status briefings from Johnson Space Center, except for a brief pause on April 6 for a lunar‑flyby experiment. The crew—Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen—has been participating in scheduled live conversations throughout the mission, keeping the public apprised of each milestone.

The successful conclusion of Artemis II, the first crewed lunar‑return flight of the Artemis program, will validate Orion’s heat‑shield performance and parachute system ahead of future moon‑landing missions.