Artemis I Splashdown 😁🌔🚀
NASA’s Orion Spacecraft Lands After Journey to Moon in Key Test for Artemis Mission
NASA’s Orion spacecraft hurtled through the atmosphere and landed in the Pacific Ocean on Sunday, concluding a nearly month-long test mission that sent it around the moon.
A major objective during the final leg of the mission was testing the heat shield.
The Orion crew module—a gumdrop-shaped vehicle that astronauts are expected to travel in during future Artemis missions—faced a significant test before splashing down under parachutes west of Baja California in Mexico. Its heat shield was expected to encounter temperatures of up to 5,000 degrees as it re-entered the Earth’s atmosphere from its journey orbiting the moon.
The spacecraft landed at 12:40 p.m. ET., the National Aeronautics and Space Administration said.
After the splashdown, NASA and the U.S. Navy began procedures to retrieve the spacecraft, according to the live stream.
NASA officials are expected to conduct a briefing about the mission Sunday afternoon.
“We are now going back into space, into deep space, with a new generation,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said on the agency live stream shortly after splashdown.
Artemis is NASA’s program to return astronauts to the surface of the moon and achieve other space exploration goals. The agency has tapped Lockheed Martin Corp., which developed the Orion spacecraft, SpaceX, Northrop Grumman Corp. and other companies to develop vehicles and components for the multiyear effort.
The agency had a challenging start to the mission, postponing two flight attempts after identifying fuel leaks that emerged on its Space Launch System rocket. Last month, the agency was able to start the Artemis I mission, as the flight that concluded Sunday was called, blasting Orion toward the moon with the SLS rocket.
Since then, officials at the agency have said the mission proceeded well, highlighting the robust performance of the SLS rocket and Orion’s relatively smooth journey to the moon and back to Earth.
Flight controllers and engineers at NASA conducted tests of Orion during its flight and were able to add new objectives because problems that emerged were relatively minor.
Orion entered and later exited a lunar orbit, traveling more than 268,000 miles from Earth at one point, or further than any other spacecraft designed to carry humans has flown before.
NASA officials have said the vehicle completed a number of important maneuvers using its propulsion system, which was jettisoned before Sunday’s re-entry, conducted other demonstrations of its hardware, and captured images of Earth, the moon, and itself.
Gathering data about Orion’s heat shield was a major objective for Artemis I, NASA officials have said. The component is designed to protect a vehicle that will carry astronauts on Artemis flights over the next few years.
Contractors for NASA are slated to continue working with the agency on planning future missions.
On Friday, the space agency said it awarded Boeing Co. a contract worth about $3.2 billion to keep manufacturing the main parts of future Space Launch System rockets the agency would use for two future Artemis flights and handle other work for rockets set to be used on missions further down the line.
At least two teams, including one led by Jeff Bezos’ space company, recently submitted bids to NASA to build a second vehicle to transport people to the surface of the moon from lunar orbit and bring them back up on future Artemis missions.
If NASA is able to keep to its current schedule, it will use another SLS rocket in 2024 to blast an Orion spacecraft with astronauts on board to orbit the moon. The following year, the agency would send astronauts to lunar orbit, where two of them would exit an Orion ship and board a Starship lander developed by SpaceX.
That vehicle would then take them to the surface of the moon. Space Exploration Technologies Corp., as SpaceX is called formally, hasn’t yet tried to conduct an orbital test flight for Starship. NASA last transported astronauts to the surface of the moon in 1972.
Write to Micah Maidenberg at micah.maidenberg@wsj.com
NASA’s Orion spacecraft hurtled through the atmosphere and landed in the Pacific Ocean on Sunday, concluding a nearly monthlong test mission that sent it around the moon.
Artemis I Splashdown 😁🌔🚀
NASA’s Orion Spacecraft Lands After Journey to Moon in Key Test for Artemis Mission
NASA’s Orion spacecraft hurtled through the atmosphere and landed in the Pacific Ocean on Sunday, concluding a nearly month-long test mission that sent it around the moon.
A major objective during the final leg of the mission was testing the heat shield.
The Orion crew module—a gumdrop-shaped vehicle that astronauts are expected to travel in during future Artemis missions—faced a significant test before splashing down under parachutes west of Baja California in Mexico. Its heat shield was expected to encounter temperatures of up to 5,000 degrees as it re-entered the Earth’s atmosphere from its journey orbiting the moon.
The spacecraft landed at 12:40 p.m. ET., the National Aeronautics and Space Administration said.
After the splashdown, NASA and the U.S. Navy began procedures to retrieve the spacecraft, according to the live stream.
NASA officials are expected to conduct a briefing about the mission Sunday afternoon.
“We are now going back into space, into deep space, with a new generation,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said on the agency live stream shortly after splashdown.
Artemis is NASA’s program to return astronauts to the surface of the moon and achieve other space exploration goals. The agency has tapped Lockheed Martin Corp., which developed the Orion spacecraft, SpaceX, Northrop Grumman Corp. and other companies to develop vehicles and components for the multiyear effort.
The agency had a challenging start to the mission, postponing two flight attempts after identifying fuel leaks that emerged on its Space Launch System rocket. Last month, the agency was able to start the Artemis I mission, as the flight that concluded Sunday was called, blasting Orion toward the moon with the SLS rocket.
Since then, officials at the agency have said the mission proceeded well, highlighting the robust performance of the SLS rocket and Orion’s relatively smooth journey to the moon and back to Earth.
Flight controllers and engineers at NASA conducted tests of Orion during its flight and were able to add new objectives because problems that emerged were relatively minor.
Orion entered and later exited a lunar orbit, traveling more than 268,000 miles from Earth at one point, or further than any other spacecraft designed to carry humans has flown before.
NASA officials have said the vehicle completed a number of important maneuvers using its propulsion system, which was jettisoned before Sunday’s re-entry, conducted other demonstrations of its hardware, and captured images of Earth, the moon, and itself.
Gathering data about Orion’s heat shield was a major objective for Artemis I, NASA officials have said. The component is designed to protect a vehicle that will carry astronauts on Artemis flights over the next few years.
Contractors for NASA are slated to continue working with the agency on planning future missions.
On Friday, the space agency said it awarded Boeing Co. a contract worth about $3.2 billion to keep manufacturing the main parts of future Space Launch System rockets the agency would use for two future Artemis flights and handle other work for rockets set to be used on missions further down the line.
At least two teams, including one led by Jeff Bezos’ space company, recently submitted bids to NASA to build a second vehicle to transport people to the surface of the moon from lunar orbit and bring them back up on future Artemis missions.
If NASA is able to keep to its current schedule, it will use another SLS rocket in 2024 to blast an Orion spacecraft with astronauts on board to orbit the moon. The following year, the agency would send astronauts to lunar orbit, where two of them would exit an Orion ship and board a Starship lander developed by SpaceX.
That vehicle would then take them to the surface of the moon. Space Exploration Technologies Corp., as SpaceX is called formally, hasn’t yet tried to conduct an orbital test flight for Starship. NASA last transported astronauts to the surface of the moon in 1972.
Write to Micah Maidenberg at micah.maidenberg@wsj.com
NASA’s Orion spacecraft hurtled through the atmosphere and landed in the Pacific Ocean on Sunday, concluding a nearly monthlong test mission that sent it around the moon.