Splashdown: The Historical Moon Mission Returns To Earth Successfully – San Diego Gay & Lesbian News
The 26-day mission is successfully completed, and a historic journey is completed. NASA’s next-generation Orion capsule came down to the earth. The test flight around the moon is meant to create a way for future astronaut missions. The spacecraft had a perfect splash down to the Pacific Ocean in San Deigo at 12:40 pm, according to the officials and the spacecraft was uncrewed.
The final stretch of its journey is finished by closing the narrow layer of the earth’s atmosphere after the travel of about 385,000 kilometers (239,000 miles) and its travel was between the moon and the earth. It was the first launch of the agency’s new Mega rocket and space capsule as a part of the mission to the moon.
Splashdown Of Orion Capsule
The capsule almost took almost a 20-minute plunge at 24,500 mph into the atmosphere of the earth and discarded its journey. The European space agency has contributed to making the housing which is the main part of the rocket system.
The last step in the journey was supposed to be the most important and dangerous one as a part of the mission. NASA administrator responded that he was overwhelmed and to him, it was an extraordinary day.
After splashing into the Pacific Ocean, the capsule was in the Pacific Ocean for about six hours while NASA was collecting some additional data and was doing some tests related before the rescue team came and moved the same. The process was for sure to conduct experiments that aim to check whether the Orion spacecraft is ready to fly with the astronauts.
According to the mission manager, Mike Sarafin, the top priority of the mission was to test Orion’s newly designed heat shield whether it withstands the atmospheric friction upon reentry which can cause the temperature to rise very high that is about 5000 degrees Fahrenheit. He said that it was their main priority. According to him, there is no aerothermal facility on earth that is capable of recreating hypersonic reentry with that type of heat shield.
What happened in the scientific journey is indeed exciting! The Orion was traveling about 32 times the speed of sound at the time it hit the air. It is much faster as it causes the air molecules to ionize and creates a buildup of plasma. As the Orion capsule reached a height of about twenty thousand feet, above the earth’s surface a change in direction happened and that sent the capsule back upward.
It is reported to have said that on its final comeback, the capsule slowed down drastically up to a speed of 32 kilometers per hour until its parachute came into action. The temperature in the spacecraft remained about 60–70 degrees Fahrenheit based on the information given.
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In addition to the completion of this project, the Artemis mission reached another great milestone and that is Orion’s wide orbit around the moon has helped it to travel a lot farther than any previous spacecraft that has been designed to carry the astronauts. The new distance record was set on November 28 when the Orion flight was about 27000 miles away from the earth.
NASA already plans two more test flights before it starts with its regular missions to Moon, and the aim is nothing but to create a Lunar base camp. A subsequent mission related to it also will carry the first woman and the first person of color help to land on the surface of the Moon. The details of the launch dates and the crew are yet to be announced.