mars-destined NASA orion spacecraft launches for first test flight

mars-destined NASA orion spacecraft launches for first test flight
images courtesy of NASA

NASA ‘orion spacecraft’ launches atop a delta IV heavy rocket from cape canaveral, florida, to begin its flight test to evaluate the capacity to send astronauts on future missions to an asteroid and to mars. the tests for the spacecraft which is built to take humans farther than ever before, consists of a four hour long journey around earth twice in order to provide insight in to its initiation and high speed re-entry systems such as avionics, attitude control, parachutes and the heat shield.

the friday morning launch from cape canaveral air force station

the launch took place early in the morning on friday 5th, in its two-hour window attempt which was missed the day before due to valve issues. its trip, designated the title of ‘exploration flight test-1’ will consist of a travel distance of 3,600 miles into space, after which, it will splash-back-down after the 120 minute mission is complete. in the future, orion will be atop a SLS, a more powerful rocket than ever before, in order to send humans to deep space destinations.

the test will evaluate its launch and re-entry systems

the orion spacecraft on top of the heavy rockets, the night before the test flight

the initial blast-off on thursday was rescheduled due to a technical malfunction causing NASA to miss the time-window

blast off!