Launch will occur from Cape Canaveral’s Complex 37 launch pad. Credit: ULAThe Orion spacecraft stands 73 feet tall. Credit: ULALaunch is set to occur at 7:05 a.m. EST on Dec. 4. Credit: ULA
The first flight test of Orion will be a two-orbit, four-hour shakedown cruise to check critical systems of the crew capsule. Credit: ULA
Mike Sarafin, NASA’s lead Orion flight director, narrates animation depicting the Exploration Flight Test 1 from liftoff aboard a United Launch Alliance Delta 4-Heavy rocket to splashdown in the Pacific Ocean.
Fresh home from a high-flying test flight Friday that took it 3,600 miles above Earth, NASA’s Orion spacecraft was pulled off a U.S. Navy recovery ship Monday night for initial inspections before a cross-country trip to its home base in Florida.
NASA’s Orion spacecraft achieved all but two of 87 demo objectives on its first orbital flight last month, but details on the capsule’s performance will require dismantling the spaceship’s outer skin in a careful procedure designed to keep most of the Orion prototype intact for future testing.
