Colorado fans fill Red Rocks Amphitheatre to hear from Artemis II crew after space mission

Space fans across Colorado filled Red Rocks Amphitheatre on Monday, where they watched the Artemis II crew take the stage. The astronauts shared some new video from their space mission.

About 8,500 people braved the heat to see the crew and also new images taken from space during the 10-day mission, which took the astronauts 694,481 miles around the Moon and back. 

More than 500 suppliers from across the Rocky Mountain region supported NASA's Artemis program mission, including the Orion spacecraft, the Space Launch System and the deep space rocket. 

The astronauts also shared a new perspective on what they saw while floating through space. 

"This is a solar eclipse no one on Earth will experience. I still don't have words for that." 

"This was the hardest thing to process on the mission for me."

"It was like the hole in the universe and the Death Star all at once and way too close to the window!"

Those were just some of the descriptions of one event experienced by the astronauts while in space. 

The Artemis II mission was the first crewed flight to the Moon and back since 1972.

NASA is preparing for next year's Artemis III mission, which will test rendezvous and docking procedures in low-Earth orbit with moon landers.