The moon appears stunning in photographs shot by NASA's Orion spacecraft as it flew barely 81.1 miles (130 kilometres) above the lunar surface during the Artemis 1 mission's closest approach to Earth's natural satellite on Monday (Nov. 21).

These detailed black-and-white photographs were captured by the Orion spacecraft's onboard optical navigation camera on day 6 of the mission, the same day it executed a critical engine burn.

Orion is currently gearing up for a critical manoeuvre on Friday that will insert the capsule into a high orbit around the moon (Nov. 25). The capsule will make a single-engine burn and, if all goes well, will remain in lunar orbit for nearly a week before returning to Earth. On December 11, the spacecraft is slated to splash down in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of California.

The Orion spacecraft's onboard optical navigation camera captured these detailed black and white photographs on day 6 of the mission, the same day it executed a critical engine burn.

According to the image descriptions on NASA's Flickr account, Orion has been busy capturing images of Earth and the moon at various phases and distances to test the effectiveness of its optical navigation camera under different lighting conditions as a way to aid spacecraft orientation during future crewed missions.

Artemis 1 is a trailblazing mission designed to test the readiness of the Orion Spacecraft and NASA's giant Space Launch System (SLS) rocket for future Artemis missions.

All being well, the pair could fly astronauts to the vicinity of the moon as early as 2024—the first time since 1972—during Artemis 2.
Around a year or two later, Artemis 3 will land astronauts near the moon's south pole.