Seems it's going to get another flight as data is within range even though they are still going through all of the data still.
]]>Splashdown! Here's how NASA will recover the Artemis I Orion capsule in the Pacific Ocean
NASA's Orion capsule is expected to splashdown at 12:40 p.m. EST Sunday, Dec. 11.
Concluding its 25½-day mission, Artemis' Orion capsule will slow from a dizzying 25,000 mph – roughly a dozen times faster than a rifle bullet – to 300 mph after entering the Earth’s atmosphere. The capsule's heat shield should reach a roasting 5,000 degrees, or twice the temperature of molten lava.
After a series of parachutes deploy, NASA engineers predict the 11-by-16½-foot capsule should slow to about 20 mph before gliding earthward and striking the sea's surface within eyesight of the recovery ship's crew, 50 to 60 nautical miles off the San Diego coast.
This post is inspired by your comments ...
As a resident, I've taken it pretty much for granted that our political system favors keeping constituents employed, where possible. The unexpected and abrupt termination of the momentum the US had going immediately after Apollo was out of the control of Congress, but what was ** in ** their control was the fate of the workforce, and the corporate structures that delivered Apollo.
It seems to me that there is a great deal more to the story of the long investment in SLS than we (humans) might (understandably) think of.
While the individual workers in the various companies engaged with SLS were not operating at the level of performance they might have achieved at SpaceX, what they ** have ** done is to sustain their families for all these years.
Your post caused me to reflect upon the implication of the Congress providing funds for an entire generation of bright young people to acquire a high level education, along with nurturing a positive attitude toward US spaceflight capability. At this point, we have no way of knowing, but I would not be at ALL surprised to learn that some of the members of that cohort are now working for either Jeff Bezos or Elon Musk, or other entrepreneurial organizations.
(th)
]]>SLS is as stated a pork barrel project but this has been the case with most US space launch capability for at least the last 50 years. It is an unfortunate result of what is a democracy people elected are intrested in being elected and as such when these come up the first question is what is in it for me. And dont get me wrong often this is a point of view were elected officials are looking out for those who elected them they want jobs and prosperity to come to their people. It just makes everything a bit more expensive.
But on this thread we asked why is the SLS not more reusable the answer is simple it is proven technology and I have to ask if your senate and congress actually trust Space X and Musk im not sure.
]]>I didn't know where else to post this, since it addresses multiple different topics. GW
From 11-23-2022’s Daily Launch
Orion Soars Past The Moon
Aviation Week (11/21) reported that five days “into the Artemis I flight test, the Lockheed Martin-built Orion spacecraft soared past the Moon, successfully conducting a 2-min. 30-sec. firing of its shuttle-era maneuvering engine on Nov. 21 to set up a slingshot maneuver into deeper space.”
CBS News (11/21) reports NASA’s unpiloted Orion spacecraft “is operating in near-flawless fashion, mission managers reported Monday, out-performing expectations on a flight to pave the way toward the first piloted mission in 2024.” The Space Launch System rocket “that boosted the Orion capsule on its way early Wednesday showed it performed almost exactly as expected, taking off atop 8.8 million pounds of thrust and producing a ground-shaking shock wave that literally blew the doors off launch pad elevators.”
Aviation Week (11/22) reports NASA’s frontline personnel “are giving their Artemis I test flight high marks so far. Launched early Nov. 16, the uncrewed Orion spacecraft occupied by sensored mannequins to evaluate the deep-space environment is to complete its propulsive maneuvering into a Distant Retrograde Orbit.”
Space Avionics Built By L3Harris Helped Propel Artemis I Launch. Aviation Today (11/22) reports that Northrop Grumman “successfully launched NASA’s Artemis I on Nov. 16 with the help of L3Harris’s space avionics.” In order to help “the unmanned spacecraft hit 17,000 mph within the first eight minutes of the flight, L3Harris provided over 30 advanced space avionics systems.” These were used “in the core, upper stage avionics, and booster for Artemis I to enable remote control, help determine the trajectory of the flight, and provide a rocket booster jettison.”
Artemis I Rocket Damaged Mobile Launcher On Lift Off. Florida Today (11/22) reports that upon liftoff last week, Artemis I damaged a mobile tower with the rocket’s sheer power. At pad 39B, “the nearly 400-foot mobile launcher not only routed communications, propellants, and hardware support for SLS ahead of liftoff, but it also had to deal with the forces that came with supporting the world’s most powerful operational rocket. Elevator doors were blown off; the deck was scorched by heat; gas lines were dislodged; and even a swath of grass at the pad was burned to a yellow hue.” Teams on the ground are still assessing the damage and figuring out how to repair it.
My take on it: It appears the initial troubles with thrust instabilities in the 5-segment SRB’s has been licked well enough. The later flights of the old Saturn-5 took place at about 8 million pounds of thrust, triggering similar effects, but there’s no one left at NASA old enough to remember what to do about it. These effects increase very rapidly with thrust level, which is why none of the “Nova” designs of 10+ million pounds thrust were ever built and flown. Wait till the try to launch a SpaceX Superheavy, and see what those effects are!
Also from 11-23-2022:
NASA Delays Dangerous Asteroid-Search Mission
Bloomberg Government (11/21) reported that NASA’s search for dangerous asteroids is “preparing for a year-and-a-half delay after lawmakers and the Biden administration sought a budget cut.” The agency’s Near-Earth Object Surveyor mission, “a plan to launch a telescope into space to search for asteroids that could strike the Earth with more force than a nuclear bomb – ... [is faced with] a budget of only $80 million to $90 million in fiscal 2023 rather than the $170 million they asked for, mission director Amy Mainzer said in a phone interview.”
My take on it: delaying this is a mistake. It’s not a huge cost like SLS, and unlike SLS, it may actually contribute to protecting the Earth from an asteroid strike. There is no better reason for a space mission or a space program than protecting the Earth.
Again from 11-23-2022:
New FAA Guidelines To Address Manual Flying Deficiency
FlightGlobal (11/23) reports that the Federal Aviation Administration “has issued wide-ranging recommendations aimed at ensuring airline pilots are properly trained to effectively manage highly-automated modern aircraft, without relying too much on technology.”My take on it: this is way overdue!
No worries as this will do.
I was also going to point out that the cube sat as well are failing since they dod not deploy as it pass the moon and the lunar lander has also failed as well.
Seems that the main months of delay and poor decisions have led to this amoung more things failing to function.
]]>It will spend 6 to 19 days in DRO to collect data and allow mission controllers to assess spacecraft performance, according to the space agency.
So far, the mission has gone mostly to plan. However, two "active anomaly resolution teams" are investigating faults in the star tracker system's random access memory and a malfunctioning power conditioning and distribution unit.
NASA's Orion spacecraft emerges from far side of moon sharing stunning views of lunar surface, Earth
At 6:44 a.m. CT, Orion's orbital (OEMs) engines lit up for about 2 minutes to thrust the spacecraft into a distant retrograde orbit around the moon. Ahead of this burn, NASA lost signal with Orion for about 34 minutes when it reached the back side of the moon farthest from Earth
If all goes well, Orion will fly more than 40,000 miles past the moon flying in orbit opposite the direction that the moon orbits Earth. After this maneuver, Orion will enter retrograde orbit for about six days before beginning the spaceflight back to Earth.
It’s the first time a capsule has visited the moon since NASA’s Apollo program 50 years ago, and represents a huge milestone in the $4.1 billion test flight that began last Wednesday.
The close approach of 81 miles (130 kilometers) occurred as the crew capsule and its three wired-up dummies were on the far side of the moon. Because of a half-hour communication blackout, flight controllers in Houston did not know if the critical engine firing went well until the capsule emerged from behind the moon, 232,000 miles (370,000 kilometers) from Earth.
The 322-foot (98-meter) rocket caused more damage than expected, however, at the Kennedy Space Center launch pad. The force from the 8.8 million pounds (4 million kilograms) of liftoff thrust was so great that it tore off the blast doors of the elevator.
Orion will fire its engines, referred to as a burn, and use the moon’s gravity to increase its speed. This acceleration, along with another burn, will help the spacecraft to pass 40,000 miles beyond the far side of the moon and get into an orbit called a distant retrograde orbit. This is a highly stable orbit, meaning the spacecraft needs only minimal fuel to maintain it, and Orion will stay there for around one week, traveling around the moon in the opposite direction from how the moon travels around the Earth.
As Orion moves into this orbit it will make its closest approach to the moon, coming within 80 miles of its surface. There are cameras on board Orion, including those located on the tips of its solar arrays, which should be able to capture some stunning views of the moon as it passes by. “After the conclusion of the outbound powered flyby, once we reacquire comm with Earth, we are expecting to provide some good imagery,” said Jim Geffre, Orion Vehicle Integration Manager, in a press conference.
How to watch the flyby
NASA will be live-streaming coverage of Orion’s flyby of the moon on the morning of Monday, November 21. You can watch coverage beginning at 7:15 a.m. ET (4:15 a.m. PT), with the spacecraft firing its engines to enter the gravity of the moon at 7:44 a.m. ET (4:44 a.m. PT). Orion will make its closest approach to the moon just before 8 a.m. ET (5 a.m. PT).There will also be another live stream on Friday, November 25, covering another engine burn which will put Orion into distant retrograde orbit. Coverage on Friday will begin at 4:30 p.m. ET (1:30 p.m. PT) with the burn scheduled for 4:52 p.m. ET (1:52 p.m. PT).
SpaceX's human landing system for Artemis 3, which will take humanity back to the Moon decades after the last Apollo mission.
Earlier this year, NASA announced that it was accepting new lunar lander proposals for use beyond Artemis 3 to ensure "redundancy in services." While SpaceX wasn't allowed to participate, the agency did say that it was planning to exercise an option under their existing contract and was asking the company to modify its landing system to meet a new requirement. That is, for its lander to have the capability to take human spacefarers from the Gateway station, which has yet to be installed in the lunar orbit, to the Moon itself. NASA can then use this upgraded lander for future missions, as humanity attempts to establish a long-term presence on the Moon.
"The aim of this new work under Option B is to develop and demonstrate a Starship lunar lander that meets NASA's sustaining requirements for missions beyond Artemis III, including docking with Gateway, accommodating four crew members, and delivering more mass to the surface."
If everyone involved in unions was rational in their negotiations with management and was both willing and able to do good work, then I would agree that unions are a net benefit. However, that is clearly not universally the case. Most businesses that don't make products for the government cannot be run the same way defense contractors or governments are run. There has to be a balance between what unions want and what management can realistically deliver, or you end up with situations similar to what happened at GM, where the employees ultimately suffered by demanding so much that GM went bankrupt, and many jobs were lost as a result.
]]>first orbital flight of Starship by either end of this year or the beginning of 2023. As part of the new contract, SpaceX will provide a second crewed landing demonstration mission in 2027 for the Artemis IV mission.
The SLS rocket launched the uncrewed Orion spacecraft on an approximately 42-day mission, during which it will orbit the moon before returning to Earth. As the first to fly, Artemis 1 will not carry a crew, but will fly on a trip around the moon with instruments, cubesats and more aboard.
Artemis 1 is NASA's first mission to the moon under the agency's Artemis program, which aims to send astronauts to the moon by around 2025 or so. That crewed moon landing will occur on the Artemis 3 mission.
Artemis is on its way but really that long to see it with a crew?
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