Until now, the spacecraft has been in the Neil Armstrong assembly facility at the Kennedy Space Center. now Lockheed Martin, which built it, handed it over to the ground crew for refueling and preparation for launch later this year
NASA's Orion spacecraft is ready for its mission to the moon. Lockheed Martin completed assembly and testing of Orion spacecraft Artemis I and transferred ownership to the NASA Ground Team (EGS) last Thursday. The EGS team, operating at the Kennedy Space Center, will make the final preparations on the spacecraft for its mission to the moon later this year.
Orion is the new spacecraft of NASA, which is classified as a spacecraft designed to carry humans and which is designed to fly astronauts into deep space, including the moon and Mars. Lockheed Martin is NASA's prime contractor and built the crew module, the twin module and the launch abort system. The European Space Agency provides the European Service Module for Orion.
mission The first Artemis would be The first launch of the Orion spacecraft aboard NASA's SLS Heavy Launch Vehicle. Over the course of three weeks, an unmanned Orion capsule will circle the moon and return to Earth. This test mission will validate the spacecraft, launcher and ground systems for future manned missions.
"Orion is a unique and impressive spacecraft and our team has done an outstanding job to get us this far," said Mike Hawes, Orion vice president and Lockheed Martin program manager. "The launch and flight of Artemis will be an impressive spectacle, but more importantly, they will ensure that Orion is ready to safely carry humans to the moon and back. This tremendous progress opens the door to a new era of deep space exploration that will ultimately benefit us here on Earth."
The Orion spacecraft was moved from the Neil Armstrong Building at the Kennedy Space Center where it was assembled to many facilities at the space center, where NASA ground crew members will load it with fuels and other consumables such as ammonia, helium and nitrogen, and integrate the launch cancellation system and defense systems. After this process is completed, it will be taken to the vertical assembly facility and lifted to the top of the SLS launcher ready to roll for launch.
Manned missions at the door
The launch later this year will herald the start of many Artemis missions to the moon. The next mission, Artemis 2, will be the first to fly astronauts into lunar orbit and back.
The Artemis 3 spacecraft will already fly two astronauts - one of them the first woman to land on the moon. Orion will bring them into orbit around the moon, where they will eventually land on the surface using a separate lunar landing system. This spacecraft is under construction at the NASA Assembly Center.
As part of the Orion production and operations contract, NASA has already ordered three Orion spacecraft from Lockheed Martin for the Artemis III-V missions with plans to order three more Orion spacecraft for the Artemis VI-VIII missions and options for up to 12 missions.
More of the topic in Hayadan:
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I did not understand,
Who is the professor from Harvard, why is she being appointed, and does Avi Blizovsky even know the difference between Equality and Equity (there is an abysmal difference), and is he aware that the leading (and not leading) universities in the US and Europe in the social sciences and the humanities have long since become an assembly line of Brainwashed political activists? And now they are preparing to take care of the STEM sciences, and the elementary school students?
Please refer to reliable sources.
I don't see anything wrong with appointing a professor from Harvard to deal with inequality
The Artemis program will be canceled or severely cut by the Biden administration, which is going to focus on ideological issues such as race, sex and welfare programs, instead of science and technological and economic progress.
And it's very funny, because the media was busy telling everyone how anti-scientific the Trump administration was, when in fact the NASA budget increased under the Trump administration (as opposed to the cuts Obama made and now Biden will make) and his liberal measures allowed private companies to develop a vaccine within a year. This week, Biden has already signed an order that will not allow this again, in the context of insulin production (of course there was not a word about this in the mainstream media, which is busy gushing about how Biden and his wife, who cheated on her previous husband, are a charming couple unlike Melania and Trump... the important things).
But the big question is actually - what will happen to Elon Musk, a semi-declared Republican, who as of last year migrated to Texas to escape the arms of the Democratic Octopus. If the Democrats continue the way they started the first week, it is quite possible that they will declare Space-X a threat and thus the new space age opened under the (so-called) "anti-science" Trump administration will end.
The important thing happening right now in the space industry is related to SpaceX and not to a program that is all heated leftovers from the "Apollo" program (in the general architecture) and the space shuttle (in the launcher equipment). Even the SR-25 engines are the ones that were disassembled and refurbished from the space shuttles, and the solid boosters are an improvement on the shuttle boosters. Everything is supremely disposable and will soon reach the bottom of the ocean at a price that the American taxpayer will be tired of paying, just as he was tired of paying for the Apollo program and the space shuttle in the past.
In short: Elon Musk wants to launch dozens (if not hundreds) of spacecraft to Mars every time there is a rendezvous. So first of all we wish him luck, but what will happen to all the launchers and the missiles and the equipment and the excess launch capacity in the two years between launch? Will they stand empty and unemployed? Of course not, as far as the hyperactive Musk is concerned! Obviously, the ability he will have will be more than enough even to launch space telescopes and space stations cheaply. I reckon we could go on starship flights for two days around the earth. 50 people at a price of $100,000 per person would be a nice income, and those who wanted might be able to get (for a significant extra charge, because refueling missions would be necessary) a fun flight around the moon.
So do you think NASA would dare to spend many Artemis flights costing half a billion dollars per man (or woman) to the moon with tourists paying a fifth of that for a fun ride around?
It probably won't happen next year.
On Saturday evening on 16-1-2021, a comprehensive system test was conducted for the entire propulsion system, which includes 4 RS25 engines and a central hydrogen and oxygen supply system for the engines. At NASA they were sure that everything was fine. And with the end of the experiment, this system is also transferred to the Kennedy Space Center to be mounted on the SLS. And this whole experiment was supposed to be one big purpose show, with announcers, commentators, and astronauts as guest commentators. The length of the experiment was supposed to be 8 full minutes, and imitate the entire process of the first stage, from beginning to end. And the system was activated. But after the 61st second due to the vibrations and heat, the fuel supply system began to disintegrate and fall into the flames of the engines. And the missile's security system turned off the engines in the 67th second of the test. And now NASA is in a big embarrassment because it is apparently necessary to plan the entire re-feeding core there (how they defined the fault: SYSTEM MAJOR FAILURE)
And it won't happen in two or three months, but much longer...
Remember the predictions that were written on a note of bazooka gum?
"When you grow up you will reach the moon"
I believe that in a maximum of 20 years we will be able to go on vacation in a hotel on the moon or at least in a hotel in orbit around the earth or around the moon.
It will probably be very expensive, but a heavenly experience.
Eli Isaac
Private programming teacher, outstanding computer science lecturer at the academy, senior software engineer.
https://eisaak123.wixsite.com/privatelessons