Watch NASA’s Artemis 1 splashdown here, starting at 11AM ET

After 25 days in space, Orion is about to conclude its uncrewed test run to the Moon. The Artemis 1 mission will draw to a close when the NASA spacecraft splashes down in the Pacific Ocean close to Guadalupe Island, which is 130 nautical miles off the coast of Baja California. Orion is scheduled to hit the water at around 12:40PM ET. NASA’s livestream will start at 11AM and continue after splashdown as a recovery team picks up the capsule. You’ll be able to watch the stream below.

NASA chose the landing trajectory and splashdown site so as not to pose a threat to people, land or shipping lanes. Just before re-entry, Orion and the European Service Module will separate, with the latter burning up in Earth’s atmosphere.

The crew mobile will carry out a skip entry technique to ensure it accurately arrives at the designated landing site. Orion will edge into the upper part of the atmosphere, then use that and its own lift to “skip” back out before re-entering for the final descent. The atmosphere will reduce Orion’s speed to 325MPH and the 11 parachutes will eventually slow it to a splashdown speed of 20MPH or less.

After multiple delays, Artemis 1 launched on November 15th as a precursor to the first crewed mission to the Moon in over 50 years. After carrying out a flyby in which it got as close as 80 miles to the lunar surface, Orion went into a distant retrograde orbit around the Moon. That allowed NASA to test various systems while minimizing fuel consumption — Orion’s cameras took some gorgeous pictures while it was out there too. The spacecraft left the Moon’s gravitational pull on December 6th as it made its way home.

Twitter Blue will relaunch on Monday with an $11 per month price tag on iOS

Following an unsuccessful first attempt at paid account verification, Twitter will start rolling out its revamped Blue subscription on December 12th, the company announced on Saturday. Twitter originally launched Blue verification for iOS devices in early November for $8 per month, but the company paused the rollout after the platform was overrun by verified trolls. On Saturday, the company also confirmed the service will cost $11 per month when users subscribe directly through its iOS. On the web, where Apple’s 30 percent commission on in-app purchases doesn’t apply, the subscription will cost $8 per month, as previously announced. 

Additionally, the company says it has implemented new measures to prevent a repeat of what happened last month. To start, users who want to display a blue checkmark on their profile will need to register with a phone number after subscribing to the service. Twitter adds subscribers can change their handle, display name and profile photo after obtaining verified status, but the company will temporarily take away their blue checkmark while it reviews their account again. “We’ve added a review step before applying a blue checkmark to an account as one of our new steps to combat impersonation (which is against the Twitter Rules,” said Twitter product manager Esther Crawford in a separate thread. 

As before, Twitter says Blue subscribers will get access to a handful of other features later, including the ability to post longer videos and see fewer ads. In the meantime, other Twitter Blue perks include the ability to edit tweets and upload 1080p videos.       

Next week will also see Twitter begin rolling out the new gold and grey checkmarks Elon Musk announced on November 25th, starting with the former for businesses. Later in the week, the company plans to begin rolling out the latter to government and “multilateral” accounts. The designators will replace the “official” label the company briefly experimented with after launching paid account verification.