NASA’s Orion spacecraft for Artemis II The test flight returned to the Final Assembly and System Testing (FAST) cell after completing a second round of vacuum chamber testing on December 5 inside the Neil A. Armstrong Operations and Checkout Building at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
After returning to the fast cell, the four main batteries – which power many of Orion’s systems – were installed in the crew module. The batteries were returned to NASA Kennedy earlier this month from their supplier, Eagle Patcher Technologies. Solar array wings will also be installed on the spacecraft by international partner ESA (European Space Agency) and its contractor Airbus in early 2025.
The Artemis II test flight will be NASA’s first crewed mission as part of the Artemis campaign, which will include NASA astronauts Reed Wiseman, Victor Glover, and Christina Koch, as well as CSA (Canadian Space Agency) astronaut Jeremy Hansen on a 10-day mission. will be dispatched. The moon and back.
Image credit: NASA/Eric Hernandez