![]() ![]() ![]() Other Orion hardware that was jettisoned during landing, including the forward bay cover and three main parachutes, would be fished from the ocean by members of the recovery team. According to a NASA blog post, "the Artemis I trajectory is designed to ensure any remaining parts do not pose a hazard to land, people, or shipping lanes." The service module is designed to burn up in the Earth's atmosphere over a stretch of the Pacific Ocean routinely used for the safe disposal of junk space hardware. It housed its engines and thrusters responsible for maneuvering the craft through space including its Orbital Maneuvering System engine, a piece of repurposed space shuttle hardware, which had previously flown 19 times. Just before reentry, the Orion crew module separated from the service module. NASA's team was preparing the capsule to be hauled aboard the recovery ship. Air Force, NASA, and Lockheed Martin – deployed from San Diego on Wednesday to a holding position in the Pacific. Navy amphibious transport ship, and the landing and recovery team – composed of about 95 people from the Navy, the U.S. The primary recovery vessel the USS Portland, a U.S. Traveling at about 300 mph, parachutes deployed to slow the spacecraft's descent to just 20 mph before splashing down and bobbing in the Pacific Ocean to await its retrieval by the landing and recovery team that was stationed nearby.Ĭhosen to avoid rough seas and winds associated with a cold front, the landing site off the coast of California near Guadalupe Island off Baja California was predetermined by Air Force weather specialists prior to the departure of the recovery team. It then plunged back in for the final descent. It then skipped back out of the upper reaches of the atmosphere alleviating some of the heat, speed, and G-forces. ![]() Orion punched through the atmosphere on a complex trajectory called a "skip reentry" experiencing temperatures of about 5,000 degrees in the process. NASA associate administrator, Cathy Koerner, said Sunday from Mission Control Center at Johnson Space Center, “There's a lot of energy in the room and it's, it's very familiar, but it's also very different as we step into this next episode in human exploration.” Coming in hot and fast Sunday's conclusion came after Orion's lunar round trip spanning a total of 25½ days and about 1.4 million miles.Ĭoincidentally, Orion's splashdown occurred on the 50th anniversary of the touchdown on the moon of NASA's last lunar mission, Apollo 17, according to NASA spokesperson Rob Navias. It all started at Kennedy Space Center in Florida with Orion's dramatic and spectacular night-illuminating launch atop NASA's 322-foot Space Launch System rocket on Nov. EST, it marked the exclamation point of NASA's nearly monthlong Artemis I test flight. After "skipping" through Earth's atmosphere blazing in at 25,000 mph, an uncrewed Orion capsule successfully splashed down in the Pacific Ocean on Sunday. ![]()
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