Artemis II crew about halfway to the moon; NASA says the mission is on track
“Since (Thursday).” Burning injection across the moon “For sending the crew around the Moon, the mission continues to perform well overall, and the crew is in high spirits,” Lakeisha Hawkins, NASA’s acting deputy associate administrator for Exploration Systems, said at a news conference on Friday.
“Right now, the crew is more than 100,000 miles away from Earth and about 150,000 miles away from the Moon.
“We call the amazing things humans do lunar accomplishments for a reason, and that’s actually literally and figuratively Our moon shot Which we are in the middle of.”
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Photo of the Earth taken by Cmdr. Reed Wiseman, NASA’s Artemis II astronaut, inside the Orion capsule on Friday. (NASA via AP)
Hawkins also shared two photos taken by astronaut Cmdr. Reed Wiseman from the Orion spacecraft.
Hawkins said the first photo shows “Back ground Detecting the aurora borealis as the crew heads towards the moon.
She said that astronaut Weizmann captured it from the window of the Orion spacecraft, and it shows two aurora and a sidereal light “at the bottom right. It can be seen with a terrestrial solar eclipse.”
“It’s wonderful to think that — except for our four friends — we’re all actors in this picture,” Hawkins said.
This image provided by NASA shows a view of Earth taken by NASA astronaut and Artemis II commander Reed Wiseman from the spacecraft’s window after completing the translunar injection burn. (NASA via AP)
The second image taken by Weizmann after the burn through the moon, which pushes a spacecraft out of Earth’s orbit, on Thursday, shows the dividing line, which separates day and night on Earth.
“So, we continue to learn about our spacecraft as we operate it in deep space with the crew for the first time, and it’s important that we remind ourselves of that as we learn more day by day,” Hawkins said.
The crew checked their windows, planned medical conferences, and while they slept, the ground crew checked how the spacecraft was working, Artemis II Ascent flight director Judd Freeling said after the injection burn across the moon on Thursday.
After the astronauts woke up on Friday morning, they were able to talk to their families.
“We planned a course correction burn,” Freeling said. “The systems are working so well now – navigation and propulsion systems together – that there was no need for this. So, we will include that in the next planned patch tomorrow.”
This image from video provided by NASA shows the Artemis II crew: Canadian astronaut and mission specialist Jeremy Hansen, left; Commander Reed Wiseman; Mission Specialist Christina Koch and pilot Victor Glover. (NASA via AP)
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Howard Ho, Orion’s program manager, said subsystems on the spacecraft continue to perform well, the air activation system is “working very well” and propellant usage was within 5% of expected usage limits.
He said they are working through one The pressure issue that relates To the helium pressurizing the fuel tanks that pushes the oxidizer and fuel out to cause some major burns.
One branch had to be isolated, but it was redundant and had no impact on the mission, Hu said.
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“We are able to do the rest of the burns during the mission without doing any regulation, which is what we call detonation mode,” he said. “In other words, there is enough helium pressure in the tanks in the oxidizer itself that we can push the fuel out without having to regulate or require more helium from the helium tanks.”
NASA’s Artemis II moon rocket lifted off from Kennedy Space Center’s Launch Pad 39-B on Wednesday in Cape Canaveral, Florida. (Chris O’Meara/AP)
He also showed a photo of part of the Earth seen through the spacecraft’s window, which he said Wiseman had also taken.
“Seeing that photo taken brings me so many great feelings,” Hu said.
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He showed another photo of the crew, joking that mission specialist Jeremy Hansen looked like he “wasn’t working hard, so I’ll have to check to see if he’s doing anything more than just lying on the side here, but it’s great to see the crew. It’s great to see their smiling faces and hear them talk about their experiences so far.”
Also on board the Orion capsule for 10 days A mission to fly around The moon is NASA pilot Victor Glover and mission specialist Christina Koch.
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