Astronauts on the Artemis II mission to orbit the moon are preparing for perhaps the most exciting phase of their journey, when they will lay eyes on the far side of the moon, as they continue on their trajectory on Sunday, April 5.
The Artemis II crew has traveled over 206,482 miles from Earth and is closing the distance with each passing second.
The mission launched on April 1 at about 6:35 p.m. ET with NASA's Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Hammock Koch, and Canadian Space Agency's Jeremy Hansen on a 10-day flight to take the crew farther into space than anyone has ever gone. Artemis IIwon't be landing on the moon; that's planned for Artemis IV in 2028.
On April 5, the crew plans to continue planned testing and conduct a burn to put them on the right trajectory for their flight path, according to the NASA schedule.
The lunar flyby will happen April 6, in a roughly six-hour window when the sun, moon and Orion spacecraft are aligned to give the crew a view of the far side of the moon that can't be seen from Earth.
See photos from space during NASA's Artemis II mission so far
Where is the Artemis II mission right now?
At about 7 a.m. ET on April 5, the Orion spacecraft carrying four astronauts was about 206,482 miles away from Earth and gaining distance by the second. It was traveling at a velocity of 1,771 mph, and was about 75,000 miles away from the moon.
You can follow along on the crew's exact movements usingNASA's Artemis II tracker.
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The tracker, called the "Artemis Real-time Orbit Website" (AROW), shows how far the Orion capsule is from Earth, its distance from the moon and how fast it's traveling.
The tracker uses data collected in real time by sensors on Orion that are sent to the Mission Control Center in Houston. The website is being constantly updated, and users can see moment-by-moment updates to the space mission's position.
More:How long will it take Artemis II to get to the moon? Here's a timeline
What are the astronauts doing on April 5?
On April 5, the Artemis II crew was set to enter a sleep period at about 3:20 a.m. ET, according to NASA'sschedule. They will be awoken around 11:50 to begin their fifth day in space. On previous days, the mission management team on the ground has played different songs to wake up the astronauts.
In the afternoon, they are set to conduct testing with the Orion Crew Survival System Suit, the suits that are "equipped with safety technology and mobility features to help protect astronauts on launch day, in emergency situations, high-risk parts of missions near the Moon, and during the high-speed return to Earth."
Later at night, they are scheduled to perform an outbound trajectory correction burn, one of three planned burns to fine-tune the Orion spacecraft's trajectory and velocity. The first burn on April 3 was canceled after flight controllers on the ground determined its trajectory was already on the right flight path.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY:See where Artemis II is right now as NASA mission approaches moon