Artemis II Crew Passes Halfway Point to Moon After Troubleshooting Toilet Failure

The Artemis II crew resolved a toilet malfunction aboard the Orion capsule while more than 200,000 miles from Earth, past the mission's halfway point to the Moon. The Universal Waste Management System failed when frozen urine blocked the vent line and the waste fan jammed. Flight Director Judd Frieling confirmed the crew and Houston ground teams restored the system within hours. The four-person crew launched April 1 on NASA's first crewed lunar mission since Apollo 17 in 1972. The mission is a flyby that will carry astronauts around the Moon and back, testing Orion's life support systems for the later Artemis III landing mission.