NASA’s Orion capsule crashed in the Pacific Ocean on Sunday.
NASA Live Stream / Screenshot of NPR
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NASA Live Stream / Screenshot of NPR
NASA’s Orion capsule crashed in the Pacific Ocean on Sunday.
NASA Live Stream / Screenshot of NPR
NASA’s new multi-billion dollar spacecraft successfully returned from the moon on Sunday, bringing the agency one step closer to sending US astronauts back to the moon in 2025.
Orion capsule splashes into the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Baja California at 9:40 a.m. Pacific Time, marking a successful one in NASA’s Artemis Program. Goddess 1 traveling 1.4 million miles, orbiting the moon and back in 25 and a half days, a feat that has not been achieved by any other highly regarded human spacecraft.
Robert D. Cabana, NASA’s deputy administrator, said that aside from a few minor hiccups along the way, the spacecraft was working “perfectly”.
The capsule performed a “skip entrance” descent, where it plunged into and out of the atmosphere to slow the vehicle before re-entering. NASA spokesman Rob Navias said: NASA live stream on Sunday.
NASA calls it a perfectly conducted “textbook entry”.
“When we looked at it from the deck as an observer, we saw three parachutes,” said NASA spokesman Derrol Nail, speaking from the USS Portland, a few miles from the crash site. full key pops out. “It was a beautiful sight, perhaps only a few thousand meters in the sky, and we witnessed that slow descent as the Orion crew module descended into the Pacific.”
The navy boat was waiting for the ammonia to drain, allotted for two hours, before closing the compartment. Ammonia, lethal when Exposed at a high level, is used for the crew module cooling system, which is critical for future crewed missions, Nail said.
A key part of the landing process was testing the spacecraft’s heat shield against the “scorching heat of the entrance” where temperatures reached about 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit around Orion, Navias said. . It’s half as hot as outside the surface of the sun.
One step to return man to the moon
The successful sensational event keeps NASA’s Artemis mission on track to send the first woman and first person of color into space. lunar surface in 2025. “This test flight is what we needed to demonstrate this vehicle so we can fly with the crew,” Cabana said Sunday. “It’s the next step and I can’t wait.”
But delays are not out of the equation, as seen in the months leading up to the capsule’s launch. NASA delay the Artemis 1 mission for several months due to what appeared to be an engine failure at the time, followed by a liquid hydrogen leak and then a hurricane. Last mission given November 16
The lunar program, named for Apollo’s twin sister, hopes to revive some of the glory that NASA’s previous moon landing missions accumulated half a century ago. One estimated 600 million people tune to see Apollo 11 landing in July 1969, when Neil Armstrong became the first man to set foot on the moon.
“It seems fitting that we honor Apollo with the new legacy of the Artemis generation and this mission today,” said Catherine Koerner, deputy administrator of the Exploration Systems Development Mission Directorate. on Sunday.
The next phase of the Artemis program will send the first crewed capsule to circumnavigate the moon and return without landing on the moon by 2024. NASA astronaut Shannon Walker on Sunday estimated that NASA will announce crew for this period sometime over the next six months.
NASA then aims to use the Orion capsule and a SpaceX’s Manned Landing System landing astronauts on the moon for the third phase of the program in 2025. Elon Musk’s company contract is valid nearly 2.9 billion USD.
NASA’s Inspector General, Paul Martin, says each of its first three flights will cost more than 4 billion USD, not including billions of development costs. And by the end of fiscal year 2025, NASA estimates it will spend $93 billion on the Artemis missions.
According to Cabana, NASA’s deputy administrator, this mission is part of an even bigger goal than what Apollo set out to do.
“We’re paving the way to not only the moon and Mars, but also establishing a presence in our solar system beyond our home planet — to explore, bring those technologies to life. into space and continue to learn and improve everything here on planet Earth,” he said.
