Tuesday, July 3, 2012

Inside the Operations and Checkout Facility at Kennedy Space Center (KSC), audience members attend an unveiling ceremony for the first space-bound Orion vehicle, on July 2, 2012.
NASA / Kim Shiflett

Orion gets its moment to shine... Yesterday morning, NASA unveiled the first space-bound Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle (MPCV) to the media and other audience members who gathered inside the Operations and Checkout Facility at Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida. This Orion capsule, which arrived at KSC last Thursday after being transported from the Michoud Assembly Facility in Louisiana, will fly on the Exploration Flight Test (EFT)-1 mission...which is slated for launch in 2014. KSC engineers will now begin the process of completing assembly on Orion over the remainder of this year and 2013, before beginning launch preparations that will see the MPCV becoming NASA's first manned spacecraft (even though it will be uncrewed on EFT-1) to fly thousands of miles beyond low-Earth orbit in over 40 years. The last flight to do so was Apollo 17 in 1972.

Engineers place the Orion EFT-1 vehicle on a workstand after it arrived at KSC's Operations and Checkout Facility on June 28, 2012.
NASA / Gianni Woods

NASA KSC Director Robert Cabana addresses the audience attending Orion's unveiling ceremony inside the Operations and Checkout Facility, on July 2, 2012.
NASA / Kim Shiflett

From left, Robert Cabana, Orion program manager Mark Geyer, U.S. Senator Bill Nelson and NASA Deputy Director Lori Garver pose in front of NASA's first space-bound Orion capsule, on July 2, 2012.
NASA / Kim Shiflett
Posted by Richard Par at 12:03 AM
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