The public today can view a mockup of the next-generation U.S. spacecraft, the Orion space capsule, in front of the Smithsonian Institution National Air and Space Museum on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.
This space capsule, after reentering the atmosphere, will return to Earth by splashing down in the ocean.
A key asset for helping to test the safety and utility of the spacecraft for its future human occupants, the Orion mockup last week underwent tests of how well it performs in water at the Naval Surface Warfare Center — Carderock Division in Bethesda. That’s where the Navy tests hull forms for huge naval ships, up to and including aircraft carriers, in giant tanks.
Next, the Orion mockup — a full-sized model — will undergo open water testing in the Atlantic off the coast of Kennedy Space Center, Fla.
The goal of the operation, dubbed the Post-landing Orion Recovery Test, or PORT, is to determine what kind of motions the astronaut crew can expect after landing, as well as conditions outside for the recovery team.
Testing how well Orion performs when it splashes down in the ocean is necessary because, unlike the space shuttles, the Orion space capsule has no wings or tail and can’t glide onto a runway on land. Rather, it will represent a return to the ocean splashdown landings of the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo space capsules back in the 1960s and 1970s.
Orion is to begin carrying humans to the International Space Station in 2015 and to the moon in 2020. Along with the Ares I and Ares V rockets and the Altair lunar lander, it is part of the Constellation Program that is developing the country’s next capability for human exploration of the moon and further destinations in the solar system.
For more information about the Orion crew capsule, please visit: http://www.nasa.gov/orion on the Web.
For information about the Constellation Program, please visit: http://www.nasa.gov/constellation on the Web.
There also are other Orion mockups intended for test launches atop the future Ares rocket. One of them will be mounted atop a prototype of the Ares I rocket called Ares I-X. The mockup will help engineers to determine how the space capsule will perform in a mission liftoff, and also to test safety systems designed to protect the Orion crew members. (Please see NASA launch schedule in this issue for details.)
The model displayed on the National Mall, measuring 16.5 feet in diameter and weighing 18,000 pounds, was built by NSWC Carderock in its Model Fabrication facility. The facility is primarily used for Navy ship and submarine model design, fabrication, mission test support, and specialized manufacturing services using computer aided numerically controlled machines, programming, stereolithography, manufacturing, wood and composite material fabrication.
The PORT objective is to determine what the environment will be like for the astronaut and recovery crews at landing, and incorporate those lessons into the spacecraft design.
The Carderock test pond provides a controlled environment for NASA space crew recovery personnel and 920th Air Wing’s Para Rescue Divers for familiarization diving before testing procedures in the uncontrolled waters of the Atlantic Ocean next week.
“Divers were in the water March 25, practicing attaching flotation collars,” said Richard Banko, Carderock lead engineer and principal Navy-NASA test coordinator. “We’re currently testing opening and closing the hatch with the flotation collars in place and then we’re going to do night testing, and conduct these evolutions all over again without natural lighting, using only the diver’s lighting.”
Carderock engineers and researchers will also participate in the testing when the model is transported to sea and launched by the NASA space shuttle solid rocket booster recovery ship. The team will quantify the seakeeping characteristics of the mockup.
In an interview this morning, Banko said that splashdowns have worked well over many decades, with only one space capsule flooding and sinking in the ocean.
Most of the Orion space capsule would be above water after a splashdown, he said, assuming a calm sea.
In earlier splashdowns, it was possible a capsule at first would invert, lying upside down in the water. But a system to buoy the Orion will right it if that occurs, he said.
(For details on the NASA Langley Research Center space capsule mockup that will test emergency abort systems, please see Space & Missile Defense Report, Monday, March 16, 2008.)