Artemis I isn't just a test run – there's science to be done

[Rick]

Artemis I isn't just a test run – there's science to be done

After several delays, NASA's Artemis I mission has finally launched and the Orion spacecraft is on its way to an orbital date with the Moon. There aren't any human passengers aboard, but that doesn't mean the mission is only about stress testing a new crew capsule.

The primary objective of the first Artemis mission is to test Orion's heat shield, mission operations and retrieval process – but there's a bunch of other stuff on board to test other craft functions too, and NASA isn't wasting the mission.

More: https://www.theregister.com/2022/11/18/artemis_i_science/

[Rick]

Orion reaches the Moon, buzzes surface, gets ready to orbit

NASA's Orion spacecraft has arrived at the Moon, and even swung around the dark side, as it prepares to settle into an orbit around Earth's biggest satellite that will take it further from home than any (eventually) manned spacecraft before it. 

Orion used its orbital maneuvering engine for two and a half minutes to accelerate around the moon for a gravitational assist NASA called the "outbound powered flyby burn," the first of two maneuvers the capsule will need to make to get into a distant retrograde orbit, or DRO. 

This Friday, November 25, Orion will perform the second maneuver, an insertion burn, which will put it into its DRO to test the capsule's ability to function in deep space.

More: https://www.theregister.com/2022/11/21/orion_reaches_the_moon_buzzes/

[Rick]

Japanese cubesat sends home pics from the far side of the Moon

Japan's Equilibrium Lunar-Earth point 6U Spacecraft (EQUEELEUS), one of 10 cubesat payloads aboard NASA's Orion spacecraft, has successfully sent back to Earth photos of the far side of the Moon.

More: https://www.theregister.com/2022/11/24/equeelus_moon_pics/

[Rick]

Orion snaps 'selfie' with the Moon as it prepares for distant retrograde orbit

Nine days into its flight to the Moon and beyond, NASA's uncrewed Orion capsule is due to fire its engines for an insertion burn that will place the craft into a distant retrograde orbit (DRO) about 50,000km from the lunar surface.

DRO provides a highly stable orbit requiring little fuel, allowing NASA to fully test Orion's systems in a deep space environment far from Earth for an extended amount time.

The orbit is so large that it will take Orion six days to complete half of a revolution, at which point the spacecraft will exit orbit for the journey back home.

More: https://www.theregister.com/2022/11/25/orion/

[Rick]

The Orion spacecraft, Moon and Earth...

APOD: https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap221201.html

[Rick]

After lunar orbit trip NASA's Orion capsule is on its way back home

NASA's Orion capsule, designed to send the next crew of astronauts to the Moon, is heading back to Earth after spending some time in a distant retrograde orbit above the satellite's surface.

The spacecraft fired its main engine on 1 December at 1553 CST (2153 UTC) for one minute and 45 seconds, changing its velocity by about 454 feet per second, NASA confirmed on Thursday. The orbital burn is the first out of two maneuvers it has to perform to put it on the right path towards home. It has spent over 16 days in space so far and is expected to land and splashdown in the Pacific Ocean somewhere on 11 December to be recovered by the US Navy.

More: https://www.theregister.com/2022/12/03/nasa_orion_capsule_moon/

[Rick]

The cubesats lost in space from Artemis Moon mission

NASA's Orion capsule splashed down on Sunday, capping a very successful Artemis I mission for the Americans. That said, it was a less successful event for the mission's 10 tiny cubesats, four of which appear to be lost after a variety of malfunctions. 

By all appearances Orion performed superbly, at least from the outside. The unmanned reusable podule is now onboard the USS Portland, which is ferrying it to shore where it will be transferred to a truck to be shipped back to Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

More: https://www.theregister.com/2022/12/12/artemis_science_payload/