NASA is ready to launch Artemis 1: these are the goals of the mission

Fifty years after the last Apollo mission. sagebrush is set to take on the mantle of lunar exploration with Monday’s test launch of the most powerful rocket in Earth’s history. POT.

The goal is to bring people back to Moon after the Apollo mission in 1972 and finally to Mars.

The launch of the 98-meter Space Launch System (SLS) rocket is scheduled for 8:33 am (1233 GMT) from the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida.

The mission, planned for more than a decade, is unmanned, but very symbolic for POTgiven the pressure from China and private competitors like SpaceX.

Hotels around Cape Canaveral are full, with between 100,000 and 200,000 spectators expected to attend the launch.

A huge orange-and-white rocket has been on the 39B KSC launch site for a week now.

“Because it was posted on the platform last week, you can feel the excitement and energy,” says Janet Petro, director of KSC. “It’s really palpable.”

Purpose of flight, baptism Artemis 1consists in testing the SLS system and the Orion crew capsule located in the nose of the rocket.

Sensor-equipped dummies will take the seats of the crew members and record acceleration, vibration and radiation levels.

In addition, cameras will capture every moment of the 42-day journey, and a “selfie” of the spacecraft will also be taken from Moon and Earth in the background.

splashdown in the pacific ocean

The Orion capsule will revolve around Moon and it will approach a maximum of 100 km and then fire its engines to travel 64,000 km farther, which is a record for a people-carrying aircraft.

One of the mission’s primary objectives is to test the capsule’s heat shield, which measures nearly 5 meters in diameter and is the largest ever built.

When re-entering Earth’s atmosphere, the heat shield must withstand speeds of over 40,000 kilometers per hour and temperatures of 2,760 degrees Celsius.

Orion, whose descent will be stopped by parachutes, will end its journey with a splashdown off the coast of San Diego in the Pacific Ocean.

Monday’s take off will depend on the weather, which can be unpredictable in Florida at this time of the year, so POT the launch window was supposed to be two hours.

If the rocket fails to take off on Monday, alternative dates are scheduled for September 2 or 5.

All is ready. POT gave the go-ahead for the mission on Tuesday after a detailed inspection.

That doesn’t mean anything can go wrong when it comes to the first flight of a capsule and rocket.

“inherent risk”

“We are doing something that is incredibly difficult to do and that comes with inherent risk,” said Mike Sarafin, mission leader. Artemis 1.

Since this is an unmanned flight, Sarafin says the mission will continue in conditions not suitable for traveling with astronauts.

“If we fail to deploy solar arrays, we will continue, and this is something that we will not necessarily do in a manned mission,” he explained.

A complete failure of the mission would be devastating for the program, which costs $4.1 billion to launch and is already behind schedule.

Next mission Artemis 2, which will take astronauts into orbit around the moon without stepping on its surface. It is expected that this will be the crew Artemis 3 one that will land on the Moon no later than 2025.

While the Apollo astronauts who were walking on Moon there were only men, the program sagebrush plans to include the first woman and the first black person.

And given that people have already visited Moon, sagebrush he set his sights on another goal: to send a team to Mars.

Program sagebrush It is proposed to establish the permanent presence of a person in Moon with a space station known as the Gateway and a base on the lunar surface.

The gate will serve as a waypoint and refueling station for the journey to Mars, which will take at least a few months.

“I think it will inspire even more than Apollo,” he says of the mission. sagebrush former cosmonaut and deputy administrator POTBob Cabana.

“It will be absolutely impressive.” (AFP)

We recommend you METADATA, an RPP tech podcast. News, analytics, reviews, recommendations and everything you need to know about the tech world. To hear better, #StayHome.