Artemis II: Around the Moon, Part 2 - Behind the Moon (2026) is a 120-minute documentary that airs free on Starlite TV's Doc Vault (CH 6) channel. It is in the U.S. public domain.
About Artemis II: Around the Moon, Part 2 - Behind the Moon (2026)
Behind the Moon
The second block of NASA's flyby-day coverage (April 6, 2026) picks up as Orion swings toward the Moon's far side. During this stretch the four Artemis II astronauts — Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen — work in shifts at the capsule's windows, photographing and describing lunar features for the science team, including regions of the far side that no human had seen directly before.
What you'll see
Mission control counts down to a planned loss of signal: as Orion passes behind the Moon, the Moon itself blocks radio contact with Earth for roughly 40 minutes. NASA confirms the loss of signal live, then talks viewers through what is happening out of contact — Earthset, the spacecraft's closest approach to the lunar surface (about 4,067 miles, according to NASA's figures), and its farthest point from Earth. The block ends with the tense wait for the signal to return, the acquisition of signal, and the first pictures sent back after the blackout.
Good to know
This is NASA's raw live coverage, so the 40-minute blackout is shown as it happened, with mission control and the science team explaining what the crew are doing while out of contact. The crew reached a maximum distance of 252,756 miles from Earth, the farthest any humans have travelled (figure as reported for the mission).
Public-domain status
Produced by NASA, a U.S. federal agency, and therefore not protected by copyright in the United States (17 U.S.C. §105). See "Rights & source" below.
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Basis: U.S. federal government work - public domain (17 U.S.C. 105)
Evidence: U.S. federal government work: NASA's official broadcast 'NASA's Artemis II Crew Flies Around the Moon (Official Broadcast)' (April 6, 2026; NASA YouTube z-j1uxBmis0), not subject to U.S. copyright (17 U.S.C. 105). Wikimedia Commons lists the same broadcast as public domain (NASA): https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:2026-04-06_NASA%E2%80%99s_Artemis_II_Crew_Flies_Around_the_Moon_(Official_Broadcast)_(1).webm . Played from the Internet Archive's H.264 mirror of the NASA broadcast.
Music: NASA-produced live coverage. Spot-checked 2026-10-10: the pre-show 'Live event starts soon' slate with music is cut (block 1 starts at 1:44); sampled caption gaps are silent live spacecraft views; no third-party network clips or commercial music found in the sampled portions. NASA insignia/logo shown as part of NASA's own broadcast (not used to imply endorsement).
Underlying rights: Clip of a 10h10m broadcast file, aired as three blocks (in-point via '#t=' on the URL). Crew audio includes CSA astronaut Jeremy Hansen as part of NASA's broadcast. Website plays the 480p H.264 MP4 (large index: ~40 MB moov, slow first load). Commons original is a 4K AV1 WebM (6h13m) - not used: no Safari/Roku support. This block: 18000s-25200s of the file.
