India, April 4 -- NASA's Artemis II astronauts fired their engines and blazed toward the moon Thursday night, breaking free of the chains that have trapped humanity in shallow laps around Earth in the decades since Apollo.

The so-called translunar ignition came 25 hours after liftoff, putting the three Americans and a Canadian on course for a lunar fly-around early next week. Their Orion capsule bolted out of orbit around Earth right on cue and chased after the moon to nearly 400,000 km away.

It was the first such engine firing for a space crew since Apollo 17 set out on that era's final moonshot on December 7, 1972. NASA reported that preliminary reports indicate it went well. NASA had the Artemis II crew stick close to home for a day ...