Artemis II crew thanks European engineers for successful moon mission

The crew of NASA's Artemis II mission thanked engineers in Germany and across Europe on Tuesday for their work on the European-built service module that powered the spacecraft during its successful journey around the moon.

During a visit to Airbus' facility in the northern German city of Bremen, US astronauts Victor Glover and Reid Wiseman thanked the engineers, saying the mission's safe return reflected their work and that the crew had entrusted their lives to the technology they built.

The European Service Module (ESM), which provides propulsion, power, oxygen and water for the Orion spacecraft, is built at Airbus' plant in Bremen.

Wiseman and Glover, together with US astronaut Christina Koch and Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen, completed the Artemis II mission in April, becoming the first astronauts to travel to the vicinity of the moon since Apollo 17 in 1972.

The four astronauts completed one orbit of the moon and travelled farther from Earth than any humans before them.