NASA says it has determined why its Orion spacecraft returned from its 25-day Artemis I flight test around the Moon with unexpected charring in its he

NASA Finds Root Cause Of Orion Heat Shield Charring

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2024-10-30 03:00:02

NASA says it has determined why its Orion spacecraft returned from its 25-day Artemis I flight test around the Moon with unexpected charring in its heat shield.

The finding was disclosed at two industry meetings on Oct. 28, with NASA’s Lori Glaze, acting deputy associate administrator for Explorations Systems Development Mission Directorate, speaking at NASA’s Lunar Exploration Analysis Group, and Lakiesha Hawkins, assistant deputy associate administrator for the Moon to Mars office, later addressing a question at the opening session of the American Astronautical Society’s 2024 von Braun Space Exploration Symposium.

“We have gotten to a root cause,” Hawkins said. “We are having conversations within the agency to make sure that we have a good understanding of not only what’s going on with the heat shield, but also next steps and how that actually applies to the course that we take for Artemis II.

“We’ll be in a position to be able to share where we are with that hopefully before the end of the year,” Hawkins said.