See Photos from the First Lunar Travelers Since 1972

“You look amazing. You look beautiful,” said astronaut Victor Glover looking back at Earth.

View of the Earth from Artemis II on April 3, 2026

NASA

Get your news from a source that’s not owned and controlled by oligarchs. Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily.

NASA just released the first photos taken by astronauts aboard Artemis II– the first crewed mission to the moon in more than 50 years. The images show Earth from space, in one photo swathed in clouds and in another almost obscured in darkness.

The four-person crew includes pilot Victor Glover, the first Black astronaut to travel to deep space, and mission specialist Christina Koch, the first woman on a lunar mission. On Day 6 of their 10-day journey, they’ll loop around the far side of the moon without landing and continue home.

“You look amazing. You look beautiful,” said Glover looking back at Earth in an interview with CBS News. “From up here you also look like one thing… No matter where you’re from or what you look, like we’re all one people.”

Back on Earth, NASA’s future is less certain. The White House has proposed cutting the agency’s science budget by 47%, and for the first time in 40 years, NASA has not committed to starting any new science missions.

They want to control the story. Our readers don’t let them.

Powerful forces are working to control the narrative, rewrite history, and keep you in the dark. That’s why the Mother Jones newsroom is fiercely independent, not backed by billionaires or bending to political whims.

But we can’t do this work without you.

Our nonprofit newsroom is funded by our readers. Each donation helps strengthen our work, so we can continue to investigate and publish, no matter what an authoritarian-minded administration wants the media to say.

Stand with us. Make a gift today.

They want to control the story. Our readers don’t let them.

Powerful forces are working to control the narrative, rewrite history, and keep you in the dark. That’s why the Mother Jones newsroom is fiercely independent, not backed by billionaires or bending to political whims.

But we can’t do this work without you.

Our nonprofit newsroom is funded by our readers. Each donation helps strengthen our work, so we can continue to investigate and publish, no matter what an authoritarian-minded administration wants the media to say.

Stand with us. Make a gift today.

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate