CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — NASA's Artemis II mission made history in April 2026 when it carried four astronauts around the Moon for the first time in more than half a century, but new research suggests the flight also left a powerful and previously unappreciated mark much closer to home: temporary "holes" in Earth's ionosphere, the electrically charged layer of the upper atmosphere, large enough that researchers say they could have briefly thrown off the accuracy of GPS signals across North America, according to a study reported this week.
Illustration: NASA's Artemis II rocket launching through Earth's upper atmosphere, with a glowing disturbed layer high above the vehicle. This is an illustration, not a photograph of the actual launch.
What Happened
According to researchers at National Cheng Kung University in Taiwan, the Artemis II flight disturbed the ionosphere not once but three times: during lift-off on April 1, 2026, during an engine burn about two hours later, and again during another burn roughly 24 hours after launch. The study, published as a preprint in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, was reported by Space.com on November 4, 2026, and covered by PEOPLE, the New York Post, Newsweek and other outlets on November 5.
The researchers reported two broad gaps in the ionosphere. One trailed the rocket's 212-foot (65-meter) core stage as it climbed through the atmosphere. The other came from two burns of the rocket's upper stage, which fired at an altitude of about 115 miles (185 kilometers) — directly inside the ionosphere — as it sent the Orion capsule on its way toward the Moon. Both disturbances stretched about 3,100 miles (5,000 kilometers) from east to west across North America, and the largest spanned roughly 50 degrees of longitude, according to the study's coverage.
To measure the effect, the team used data from terrestrial GPS receivers — the same kind of ground stations normally used to track minute shifts in the Earth's crust. By measuring how long GPS signals took to travel from satellites to the receivers on the ground, the researchers were able to reconstruct how the mission changed the concentration of free electrons in the ionosphere. According to reports of the study, the team drew on data from about 3,500 ground stations. The changes they found were equivalent to GPS positioning errors of several meters.
The study described the lift-off impact as more powerful than that of any other rocket launch observed to date. Reporting on the research also said the disturbance was up to ten times stronger than those seen after SpaceX's Starship test launches. "This is the first time a single space mission produced three instances of ionospheric disturbances over the same region during successive orbit maneuvers," the study noted, according to Space.com's reporting.
It is important to be clear about what the researchers did — and did not — find. The study found no evidence that the Artemis II mission caused any crashes, navigation failures or other real-world problems for self-driving cars, drones or anyone relying on GPS. What it found was that the disturbances were large enough that they could have caused brief, localized errors in GPS positioning. The distinction matters: the effect was detected in measurement data, not in a log of accidents or outages.
Background
Artemis II launched from Launch Complex 39B at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida on April 1, 2026, at 6:35 p.m. EDT, carrying NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen aboard the Orion spacecraft. It was the first crewed flight of NASA's Space Launch System rocket and the Orion spacecraft, and the first time astronauts had travelled around the Moon since the Apollo era ended in 1972.
The crew flew a roughly ten-day loop around the Moon without landing, coming within about 6,545 kilometers (4,067 miles) of the lunar surface during a flyby on April 6 and 7, and reaching a record distance of 252,756 miles from Earth — the farthest humans have ever travelled from home, surpassing the mark set by Apollo 13 in 1970. The Orion capsule, which the crew named Integrity, splashed down in the Pacific Ocean off San Diego, California, on April 10, 2026, after a flight of about 700,237 miles. NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman called it a "perfect mission."
The new study does not change that verdict. It looks instead at a side effect of the journey that was invisible to the astronauts and to everyone watching the launch. The ionosphere is the electrically charged region of the upper atmosphere, beginning at altitudes above about 30 miles (50 kilometers). Every GPS signal must pass through it on its way from a satellite to a receiver on the ground, and changes in the layer's electron density can alter how long that journey takes — which is exactly how a receiver works out where it is. Rocket exhaust reacts with the layer's charged particles, temporarily depleting free electrons in what scientists call an "ionosphere hole," and the layer then refills.
That combination — a very large rocket, engines firing inside the ionosphere, and repeated maneuvers — is what the study's authors say set Artemis II apart from earlier launches. "Rocket launches from the ground to space produce that kind of effect, but we have never seen this kind of orbital maneuver in an interplanetary mission," study co-author Charles Lin, an earth science professor at National Cheng Kung University, told Space.com.
Illustration: GPS signals from satellites passing through a disturbed ionosphere layer above North America, showing a depleted gap where signals are bent and scattered. This is a diagram-style illustration, not a real satellite image.
Why It Matters
The finding matters because GPS has quietly become infrastructure that modern life depends on. It guides aircraft, ships and cars, times financial transactions, synchronizes power grids and mobile networks, and underpins the navigation systems of drones and self-driving vehicles. A positioning error of a few meters sounds small, but for some of those uses it is not trivial — and that is the point the study's authors emphasized.
"A positioning error of a couple of meters is enough to cause an autonomous car to change lanes," Lin told Space.com. "It could have a strong impact not only on self-driving cars but also on drone positioning." The researchers' concern is not that Artemis II caused any such incident — again, the study found no evidence of one — but that the margin for error in automated navigation is thin, and that a disturbance measured in meters is large enough to matter if it ever coincided with a vehicle relying entirely on GPS at that moment.
The study also arrives at a moment when the pace of heavy spaceflight is accelerating. NASA is preparing Artemis III, the mission intended to return astronauts to the lunar surface, and other agencies and companies are planning their own Moon and Mars missions. If large rockets launch more frequently, Lin warned, the ionospheric disturbances they cause could become more relevant. Speaking to Newsweek, he said the disruptions were so large that researchers believe they could have caused a very brief disruption in GPS accuracy — and that if such major missions happen with more frequency, these disturbances to GPS signals could become more relevant. The implication is not that Moon missions should stop, but that their effects on the atmosphere above us deserve to be monitored and understood as launch rates climb.
For the public, the practical message is reassuring rather than alarming. No GPS outage was reported during or after the Artemis II launch, no vehicle was reported to have been affected, and the disturbances were temporary. The ionosphere refills, the effect fades, and everyday GPS use — from phone maps to aircraft navigation — went on as normal. The study's contribution is to show that even a successful, flawless mission can leave a measurable trace in the sky, and that the trace is worth watching as the era of frequent deep-space flight begins.
What Happens Next
The next steps belong largely to researchers. The study's authors and other scientists are expected to keep analyzing the Artemis II data, including how long each disturbance lasted and how quickly the ionosphere recovered, details that early coverage did not fully pin down. Further work may compare the Artemis II measurements with data from other large launches, and may look at whether similar effects can be detected after future Artemis missions and other heavy-lift flights.
NASA has not publicly commented in detail on the study's findings. PEOPLE reported that NASA did not immediately respond to its request for comment on the study. Any formal response from the agency, or from the team behind the Artemis program, would be a natural next development to watch, as would peer-reviewed publication of the full study following its preprint appearance in Geophysical Research Letters.
Meanwhile, Artemis III — the mission planned to land astronauts on the Moon — remains the program's next major milestone, and its launch will offer scientists another chance to watch the ionosphere in real time. If the Artemis II findings hold up, launch planners and GPS operators may in future treat a heavy launch the way meteorologists treat a solar storm: as a known, temporary disturbance to plan around. For now, the study stands as a reminder that the journey to the Moon begins — and leaves its mark — in the sky directly above us.
Illustration: The Artemis II Orion spacecraft and its four-person crew on their lunar flyby mission, with the Moon below and Earth in the distance. This is an illustration, not a photograph from the mission.
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FAQ
Did Artemis II really tear a hole in Earth's atmosphere?
Not in the literal sense. Researchers found temporary regions of the ionosphere — the electrically charged layer of the upper atmosphere — where free electrons were depleted after the rocket's exhaust reacted with charged particles there. Scientists call these depletions "ionosphere holes," but the layer refills over time, and the effect was temporary. The April 2026 mission itself was a complete success, with the crew splashing down safely on April 10, 2026.
Did the Artemis II launch disrupt GPS for ordinary users?
No outage was reported. Ground-based GPS stations detected changes in the ionosphere equivalent to positioning errors of several meters, but the study found no evidence of crashes, navigation failures or other real-world problems for drivers, self-driving cars or drones. The effect was brief and localized, and everyday GPS use continued normally.
How big were the disturbances?
According to the study, the two disturbances each stretched about 3,100 miles (5,000 kilometers) from east to west across North America, with the largest spanning roughly 50 degrees of longitude. The lift-off impact was reported to be more powerful than that of any other rocket launch observed to date, and coverage of the research said the disturbance was up to ten times stronger than those seen after SpaceX's Starship test launches.
Why was Artemis II's effect so much stronger than other launches?
Researchers point to a combination of factors: the very large Space Launch System rocket, and upper-stage engines that fired directly inside the ionosphere at about 115 miles (185 kilometers) altitude, rather than merely passing through it — and did so more than once, during burns about two hours and about 24 hours after launch. According to the study, this was the first time a single mission produced three ionospheric disturbances over the same region during successive maneuvers.
Could future Moon missions cause bigger GPS problems?
Possibly, if heavy launches become much more frequent, according to study co-author Charles Lin. He told Newsweek that if major missions like Artemis II happen with more frequency, these disturbances to GPS signals could become more relevant. The effect is temporary and the ionosphere recovers, but researchers say it is worth monitoring as launch rates rise and automated vehicles rely more heavily on precise positioning.
Sources
- Space.com, "NASA's Artemis II moon launch tore a hole in Earth's upper atmosphere so huge it disrupted GPS signals," November 4, 2026 — Space.com report via syndication
- PEOPLE, "Historic NASA Mission Created Temporary 'Hole' in the Earth's Upper Atmosphere, Which Could Have Impacted GPS: Study," November 5, 2026 — people.com
- New York Post, "'Strong impact:' Artemis II mission tore GPS-disrupting holes in atmosphere," November 5, 2026 — nypost.com
- Starlust, "Artemis II left temporary holes in Earth's upper atmosphere that could have affected GPS, new study finds," November 4, 2026 — starlust.org
- Newsweek, via PEOPLE and Wyoming News coverage, November 5, 2026 — Wyoming News (Newsweek reporting)
- NASA / Associated Press mission coverage, April 2026 — Artemis II launch April 1, 2026, splashdown April 10, 2026 — Florida Today
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