NASA officials say the Artemis 1 mission teams are “giddy” after witnessing their Orion spacecraft’s performance so far on its way to lunar orbit.
Artemis 1 launched at 1:47 EST (0647 GMT) on November 16, blasting off from Kennedy Space Center in Florida in a spectacular demonstration of the sheer power of NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket. The Orion spacecraft reached Earth orbit shortly after, then 87 minutes after launch performed a so-called trans lunar injection burn to send him flying towards the moon. Monday (21 November), Orion performed another burn to send the spacecraft close enough to the lunar surface to take advantage of the moon’s gravity to pull the spacecraft around the moon into a distant retrograde lunar orbit.
After collecting data from this propelling maneuver, NASA officials held a briefing Monday evening (November 21) to discuss Orion’s powered flyby of the moon. Judd Frieling, flight director at NASA’s Johnson Space Center, said Orion mission team members were “stunned” by the current performance they see from the spacecraft after the flyby, which saw the spacecraft come within 80 miles of the lunar surface.
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Frieling added that flight controllers have so far been amazed by the stellar performance they’ve seen from Orion. “As for the flight controllers themselves, they’re also absolutely amazed at, you know, these great videos that they’re able to get from the Orion spacecraft,” Frieling said. “On top of that, you know, they’re just happy that all the hard work and dedication they’ve put in over many, many years is really paying dividends.”
Howard Hu, Orion program manager, said the team has seen “very good performance across the board on all of our subsystems and systems and we are certainly very pleased with the performance” of the spacecraft so far.
“Today was a great day,” Hu added. “We come in every day and it doesn’t seem like work. I mean, it’s just amazing. I want to hear the information coming from the spacecraft, learn about the spacecraft and be excited about what we do . And it’s just, it’s just phenomenal. I have a big smile every day.”
The briefing also touched on the launch of the Space Launch System rocket of the Artemis 1 mission on November 16. Mike Sarafin, Artemis 1 mission manager at NASA Headquarters, said the SLS rocket performed perfectly during launch. “The results were stunning,” Sarafin said. “The rocket performed and/or exceeded expectations.” Sarafin added that the “lighter and smoother” refueling procedure that was carried out for the third successful launch attempt also produced the results expected by mission officials, circumventing some of the problems that previous attempts plagued.
Sarafin also discussed the damage to Kennedy Space Center’s Launch Pad 39B during the launch. While much of the damage was expected and similar to other launches, the 8.8 million pounds of thrust produced by the SLS vehicle’s center stage and two solid rocket boosters literally blew doors off. “The elevator system is not working right now,” Sarafin said. “We had the most powerful rocket in the world and the pressure blew our elevator doors off.”
Sarafin said a segment of RTV, the insulating caulking around Orion’s base that was damaged by Tropical Storm Nicole, was found in the field surrounding the rocket. It is unclear if it was taken down during the launch or if it was already ripped off by Nicole. A storm-damaged strip of this caulking was a cause for concern before launch, but mission officials determined it would not be a risk.
The Artemis 1 mission has sent Orion to the moon on a 26-day journey that will see the spacecraft approach within 80 miles of the lunar surface at its closest pass, and around 40,000 miles at its furthest point. The mission is designed as a flight test of the Space Launch System rocket, Orion spacecraft and associated ground control systems ahead of the Artemis 2 and 3 missions currently scheduled for 2024 and 2025, respectively.
After drifting away from the moon, Orion will return to Earth where it will plunge into the Pacific Ocean on December 11.
“I will be resting well on December 11 after the splash and recovery, along with these gentlemen and their teams,” Sarafin said.
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