Thursday, February 8, 2018

Photo of the Day: A Milestone for Orion's Abort Test in 2019...

A full-size Orion mock-up is about to be transported from NASA's Langley Research Center to the adjacent Joint Base Langley-Eustis in Virginia on January 26, 2018...to undergo a paint job for Orion's 2019 Ascent Abort 2 test.
NASA / David C. Bowman

Orion AA-2 Crew Module Painted for Flight (News Release - February 6)

The Orion crew module for the Ascent Abort Test 2 (AA-2) was transported from NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, to the Joint Base Langley-Eustis Friday, Jan. 26, for a fresh coat of paint before final testing and shipment to NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. Specific flight test markings are being painted on the crew module to allow for attitude and trajectory data collection during launch. Next, it will be tested to determine the module's mass and weight, and also its center of gravity or balance, and then delivered to Johnson for integration and additional testing.

The crew module to be used for the test, fabricated at Langley, is a simplified representation designed to match the outer shape and approximate mass distribution of the Orion crew module that astronauts will fly in. During the test, planned for April 2019, the launch abort system will be activated during challenging ascent conditions at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Source: NASA.Gov

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