If anyone is interested it the actual orbital tracks of Artimus II and (included), Artimus 1 and Apollo 8, this clip shows some nice stuff.

Some nice info of the moons orbit and shows how much work (math's), must have gone into working it all out.

Artimus II starts at 9:45

Nostalgia for the NASA launch and mission tv broadcasts of old? ....

Skipping anything much autobiographical other than to say that I have tried to follow NASA spaceflight, space science and (to a lesser extent) aeronautics fairly closely since . . . well, not actually since the failed launch of Vanguard in December 1957 but by the time of Alan Shepherd's suborbital flight four years later, I was stridently captivated by NASA insofar as 1960s-era tv coverage (and kid-age books) allowed. I note this because when I think back to Jules Bergman's commentary during NASA crewed spaceflight missions, the viewing public obviously is not getting the same quality. Even set "only" in the anchorman role, Cronkite had such gravitas.

A caveat to the decline in useful and meaningful coverage is found in the appearance on CNN yesterday of Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson, the noted astrophysicist. (Another prof also was present for the segment but I haven't recalled his name, unfortunately.)

Anyone missing those earlier eminences of broadcast coverage might find solace in two facts, one positive, the other not so much.

The current SLS upper stage is powered by an RL-10 engine (uncertain as to the iterated variant, though Wikipedia indicates it is an RL-10C-1-1, standard for the Centaur V upper stage). The RL-10 was developed in the late 1950s by Pratt and Whitney and in its manufacturing legacy, boasts as cool a space-truckin' name as Aerojet Rocketdyne. All the CNN etc blatherers in existence cannot detract from the continuity of "space coolness" represented by the role - the ongoing role - of the RL-10.

On the downside, though. A preeminent and prolific voice in what might be called the "space law pacifist and anti-U.S. cadre" is a certain attorney with several advanced degrees. I believe this person's original specialty area of law was international humanitarian law, or the law of armed conflict. As an academic pedigree, it's all just grand. But not unlike the blathering types, this attorney too often does not know what they're talking about, and it's embarassing. For example, in discussing some aspect of Space Law in a seminar presentation, the attorney stated that Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chafee had died in a launch accident. Which was true, in part - they died, and it happened on a launch pad. But as anyone who knows even the simplest things about space programs and technologies would be quick to point out, the Apollo 1 fire occurred during a test, not a launch attempt. Apollo 1 is not something anyone who wants to be taken seriously can afford to badly fumble in substantive terms and retain credibility - again, not unlike the blathering types unavoidable on broadcasts.

Almost as bad, the attorney repeated the same type of error recently. They referred to the wet dress rehearsal tests of the SLS/Orion stack which did not result in readiness for launch - as launch attempts which were "scrubbed". Not quite; no launch was scheduled for the date of those tests, kinda sorta like the nomenclature "wet dress rehearsal" suggests, no?

So a stack (pun intended) of advanced law degrees is not insulation against getting the facts wrong about fundamental aspects of space programs and technologies. At least this attorney did not refer to the RL-10 as being built by Boeing. At least, not yet.

Interesting ramble on your post :)

But on the engine part: (in my feeble mind and not AI's), wasn't all 'Rocket' stuff done by the Soviets and Germany?
AFAIK, the 'Full flow' that Space X uses is of original Soviet design.
Of course technology and design tweaks will improve any engine.

Yes, a tragedy with the internal fire, (comms crossed over voltage + pure oxygen), wasn't it a design flaw added that mix - internal opening as against the 'away' opening...?
Space is hard and is pushing mankind to keep advancing in this area.

One looks at the 'latest' 3.7mtr crew area and it's like packed sardines!
Is the weight that critical to not have a more spacious capsule.
On that note, I notice the lack of paint job as the first Shuttle launch - straight from the factory ;)

It is worth keeping an eye out for the new images here: https://images.nasa.gov/ or here: https://www.nasa.gov/artemis-ii-multimedia/

In reverse order;
Crewed spacecraft have always been cramped, and in comparison the Apollo Command Module (with three astronauts) - as I recall it in photographs - was even more cramped than Orion. The Space Shuttle Orbiter may have been somewhat less constrained, but its strictly Earth-orbiting role makes the comparison somewhat inapplicable.
And yes, though I'm not an engineer, it's fairly commonly observed that weight is a primary limiting factor in spacecraft design, whether for crewed spacecraft or satellites.
To the extent the Integrity Orion spacecraft (and/or the ESA Service Module) are relatively unpainted, perhaps this relates to the test flight objectives of the Artemis II mission.

On Apollo 1, without question there were design flaws. The reports following the accident (though I have not reviewed them in some time) document these flaws extensively and in-depth. As you mention, the pure oxygen interior atmosphere, and hatch design were major factors. (Appropos of my rant against ignorance on the part of would-be scolders of U.S. policy, nothing about the causes and effects leading to the Apollo 1 fire and deaths of three astronauts justifies referring to the accident as having occurred during a "launch.")

Rockets, missiles, space launch vehicles. Nothing about the history of these machines, as it has unfolded in the United States, should downplay or understate the tremendous role played by Dr. Prof. Werner von Braun. So, at the risk of understatement here, yes indeed, work done by "the Germans" has been foundational. Perhaps in his role in the achievement which the Saturn V moon rocket constitutes Dr. Prof. von Braun - or at least his karma - finds redemption from his wartime acts.

But whether or not the RL-10 engine, in its earliest design and testing in the late 1950s, drew heavily, or at all, upon the legacy of the V-2 and "Paper Clips" of certain types, I don't know.

The Russians did (according to some down-'n-dirty interweb reading) develop full-flow engine technology. The RL-10 however is not a full-flow type of engine. Perhaps of equal or greater relevance is that the U.S. relied on RD-180 engines built by Russia (some possibly produced in the U.S. under license) for the Atlas V. There is a Space Foundation Fact Sheet on the history of the RD-180 and RD-181 in the U.S., (based on its citations, originally written circa 2013-2014 and updated since then).

Side story concerning Dr. von Braun: I attended a well-respected private secondary school in Atlanta, Georgia, USA. The school's stationery letterhead states "A Christian Preparatory School for Young Men and Women." They were not kidding about the Christian part! Consumption of alcohol was strictly verboten. Drinking any spirituous concoction other than Communion wine would result in immediate expulsion, no explanations nor excuses accepted!

And so it came to pass that graduation day approached. Wernher von Braun's lovely daughter was the Valedictorian of her class; the guest speaker was to be her father. Uh Oh! Guess who got caught drinking a martini the night before graduation? Yep! By a faculty member, no less! Out she went and her father was a no-show. She never did receive her sheep skin and we never got to hear Wernher count backwards from ten.

And now back to our regularly scheduled thread!

- Ed

[QUOTE]Practice for the Artemis II return is taking place off the Coast of California including the NT-43A (aka RATT55) this evening.

The Artemis II Orion spacecraft is scheduled to return to Earth on Friday, April 10, 2026, with a splashdown in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of San Diego, California, at approximately 8:07 p.m. EDT (5:07 p.m. PDT).

Reentry into Earth's atmosphere begins around 6:33 p.m. EDT.
[/QUOTE]

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....29890ffec.jpeg

https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....e451b384f.jpeg
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Regarding the Orion return. I understand there will be a two steps reentry. The first one being an aerobrake maneuver. Will that one also be observed via a NASA WB-57 or alike? And where on the globe will that be taking place, also the East Pacific?

Capsule re-entries tend to be a skip and a plunge. The skip uses the aerodynamic properties of the underside to generate lift (and therefore drag) to climb before the final entry at a lower speed. The Shuttle was not the first lifting body space vehicle. Apollo did it decades earlier.

The Raptor a smaller less powerful little engine compared to the RS-25?

https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....650a9aaf95.png

If you want to argue the pros and cons of different rocket designs, this is a good place to start. It's 6 years old now and things have moved on a bit but the way Tim Dodd explains these quite complex machines to the layman is well worth seeing.

I see. I was rather thinking of something like in "Odyssee 2010" movie, the aerobraking maneuver at Jupiter (w/o inflatables of course).

I apologise. I was egregiously confusing the Merlin engines which current SpaceX rockets use with the Raptor which is being used on the Starship. I think It's probable that Raptor wasn't complete or flown when choices about the SLS were being made. I think you still cannot compare them on price yet because one is a leftover freebie and we don't know the price of the newer version of it.

I read that it will splash down off the coast of San Diego, CA. They didn't say how far from the coast though :)

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....fe2c9832a1.jpg
This was shared on the NASA site (here: https://www.nasa.gov/blogs/missions/...-to-come-home/)

................

I have read these amazing figures elsewhere. The linked article goes even lower:
But now someone has to thoroughly double-check these claims, as this will place Raptor engines in the same price bracket than light helicopter turboshafts. Either rocket engines are intrinsically so simple to make, or Safran, P&WC and RR are real grifters.

Or said price should be understood per flight, with each engine reused multiple times. And the overhaul cost per flight is wayyy lower than the cost of a turboshaft overhaul...

It's stunning how much money we're spending on the "leftover freebies"
The entire rational for Artemis was how cheap it was going to be because we were using "proven" technology from the Space Shuttle - yet the cost per launch of Artemis dwarfs the Saturn V (even when accounting for inflation).

Due to land approx..

Sat 11th 00:05 UTC

Scott Manley does a nice 15min clip of the Heat Shield and also discusses the 'Skip Entry Landing Technique (7:50).

Watching on BBC. QUOTE. When we lose comms, will we also lose the video feed? Really!!!

It's now that everyone on the scene should be wearing Planet of the Apes masks and costumes. When the door opens one of the recovery team yells, "Who is the joker that put humans into clothing?" Then, "How did they get out of the restraints?"

Well... speaking as a retired marine rescue and auto extracation trainer, I would have done that capsule interaction somewhat differently. The first thing I would train is to assure stability before doing anything else, most certainly including not opening a hatch. And they bagged it open, so it could not even be closed again if the water got rough. Obviously, there was difficulty getting the flotation ring fitted to the capsule and inflated, but it's the opening the hatch, and then preventing it's being quickly closed if needed which caught my attention. It left the astronauts very vulnerable for much too long...

Liberty Bell 7 resounds in my mind, and Gus Grissom was alone, and got out with adequate safety - lucky!

Good grief that took an age. Did it take that long to recover Apollo?
Space X has the right idea. Reverse the boat up to the capsule. Lift and load. Job done

The reentry velocity returning from lunar orbit is much higher. That might not make a difference, but other factors do.

One is that this was a test flight. NASA (at the press conference) stated that "underwater divers" had photographed the heat shield. The confirmation of safety factors (no hydrazine leakage for example) also takes time.

Also SpaceX is not coextensive with the United States; its accountability is fundamentally located in its financial performance. NASA is the United States, in the sense that its accountability is located upon the country itself. Move fast and break things doesn't necessarily work so well for a country. Especially with regard to human spaceflight, and even more so with unproven hardware, such as the Orion spacecraft including its service module.

This all said, when I saw the hatch had been opened and covered, I had the same kind of thought - seas are relatively calm now, but.......

As a very non-scientific layman could someone explain why that would be?

I understand, I think, that the velocity would be higher because the capsule was being pulled in from outside low earth orbit, please correct me if I'm wrong. What I'm don't understand is why the craft isn't brought back into low earth orbit to slow it down to a similar speed to that which a Soyuz or Boeing capsule would re-enter the atmosphere on return from the ICC. If it were possible would there be any technical benefit in doing so?

To enter LEO would require an orbital insertion burn; Which would require quite a lot of fuel; Which you would have to have hauled all the way to the Moon; Which would have required a great deal more fuel.

It would be technically possible, but hugely expensive.

It's a LOT cheaper to just use a heatshield, track, and capsule shape that can handle the higher reentry velocity.

bilby_qld,

Thank you very much for your clear and concise explanation.

Now those I want to see to understand if they totally solved the problem or how touch and go I actually was.

What happens to the `service` module after it is cast adrift...? Still orbiting,or left to `burn-up`..?
Further,are the parachutes recovered,or left to sink..?

During the NASA livestream yesterday, I heard either the reporter on the USS John P. Murtha (Ms. Cruz - google says it's Megan C.), or the highly recognizable NASA Mission Control voice (the eminently authoritative and yet calm Rob Navias), state that recovery of the parachutes was in work by the divers. Whether that element of the recovery activity was completed successfully, I do not know.

As for the European Service Module (ESM) of the Artemis II Orion spacecraft, as widely known it was built pursuant to NASA agreement with the European Space Agency (ESA) and specifically by Airbus Defence and Space (Bremen, Germany). Wikipedia confirms what I thought was probably its technological heritage; the ESM was based on ESA's Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV), which conducted supply and trash disposal missions to and from the International Space Station (ISS). As a result, other things being equal, the ESM would have followed a re-entry trajectory resulting in burning up in the atmosphere, similar to the ATV spacecraft. But wait.....

Other things are not at all equal. Separation of the Orion Command Module from the ESM occurred 20 or 30 minutes prior to Orion starting its re-entry into Earth's atmosphere. We know this because Orion had to be reoriented so that the heat shield was facing forward (which I recall from the broadcast yesterday; which also makes sense based on fundamental mission and module architecture carried over from Apollo; and which specific number(s) of minutes as stated via google). At the time of ESM "sep", the spacecraft were traveling, as it were, the reverse trajectory of TLI, Translunar Injection, and though I claim no knowledge of either the maths or physics of orbital dynamics, the ESM - if I am understanding the particular factors correctly and properly - not only burned up as a result of its atmospheric re-entry . . . given its lack of heat shield, it really, really, got burned out. Or up.

Which perhaps leaves an opening for a wisecrack. The ESM was built by a multinational space agency in Europe, built by a European aerospace company, built in Bremen. Sehr gut! And at the same time, the recent information on a different thread about bomber missions during the conflict in Iran and the Middle East continues to evoke images from the 1949 Hollywood film, somewhat based on and true to the historical factual record, "Twelve O'Clock High" (Gregory Peck, in the starring role). About daylight bombing raids during the Second World War against Germany. There is such a huge, seemingly inexplicable gap between those missions, and the successful mission of the European ESM and Orion CM. I take this as an occasion to suggest there should be no gap between our - the United States' - partners and friends in space programs and technologies. And further to suggest that those who bash Europe's manifest connections both to the United States and to the world's interconnected systems being run on the basis of something like "rules" really are speaking in idiocies. Those interconnected systems have no "Separation" on their operational timeline. And if such separation were possible - which it is not - at least one of the separated "spacecraft" will really, really burn up.

[edited for correction of certain typos]

Just spotted this on the web :E

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....a1053b474a.png

Artimus II crew speak on stage. 11:30

The non-scientific explanation is that the capsule fell nearly straight down from 250,000+ miles high.

As mentioned, to slow it down to the same orbital speed it had before it left would require retaining that much fuel, 1000 pounds, and would have required an addition amount to lift the orbit to circle the Moon, and required more fuel in the various booster stages. Worse, that engine is using fuel and oxygen from liquified gas tanks. Keeping the hydrogen and oxygen liquified for the duration of the trip would likely require a much larger amount that would be vented off during the trip and would have to be accounted for as the reaction force from the expelled gas would have some effect on the path.

Even so, a heat shield is required at the lower speed.

After watching the recording of the event in Houston welcoming the Crew of Artemis II home:

The author of The Right Stuff, Tom Wolfe, might have some trouble coining an apt phrase for these four Astronauts (3 NASA, 1 Canadian Space Agency (CSA)). Quite a distance from the archetype celebrated in that book (and represented tolerably well in the Hollywood portrayal). Were the "something of a dude" in New York - because of his famed sartorial style - writing today, I am inclined to believe that in order to produce similarly memorable writing about these Astronauts' "stuff", Wolfe would have turned back to his previous work. Not Right Stuff - no, he would have used The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test as inspirstuon and lodestone.

Too freaking much!! Space explorers with enough gratitude to be credible about it!! And throw politics out the urine-dump spacecraft vent and into space - there on the stage was the Maple Leaf flag next to the Stars and Stripes - that ought to blow some of the buttoned-down uptight minds! And for the inclusion (deliberate word choice) of French by the CSA Astronaut - "That's good thinking there, Cool [Astronaut]."*

*first line of The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test (1968)

Incredible that Isaacman, as the NASA Administrator, took the time and effort to respond so transparently to a reporter on X.

Service module burns up.

Not sure about the chutes...on some previous missions/projects they were recovered, not just for enviromental reasons but also to check for damage.

I’m not a ‘space guy’, but I am a ‘risk guy’, and the thing that worries me - and it worries me a lot - about NASA, is that it’s the exact same areas in which the issues are occurring this time around. Now, in some, that’s because they are really difficult, and in the absence of breakthrough technology or new materials it always will be, but I’m not sure if that’s the case across them all. The outcome of this is that there are both controlled and uncontrolled risks at what aviation would perceive to be wholly unacceptable levels, and the possibility of tragedy is, to my risk-averse mind, horrifically high.

Now, as long as those involved and those around them understand and accept that, perhaps it’s tolerable, but this brings to mind parallels with those who are, after death, described as having departed this world, ‘doing what they loved’. It’s always been my opinion that if you could, in those cases, freeze time half a second before impact, and ask them, ‘how do you feel about dying now, is it worth it?’, their answers would be resoundingly, ‘no’. Where the endgame of a successful outcome is fame and fortune, I’m even less sure decisions are balanced.

But more worryingly, the recurring nature of the problem areas could - and note, only could - indicate that structural weaknesses in the agency’s practices, people, software and hardware, previously identified or hinted at in the aftermath of Challenger or elsewhere, may not have been thoroughly addressed, and the worst possible outcome would be a loss, followed by an investigation which found those things true. I do worry that that is a possibility.

Space travel is inherently dangerous. One of the mistakes NASA made during the Shuttle era was to treat missions after the first four as ‘operational’ rather than test flights. This mindset, in my opinion, is where danger lies.

I believe it’s important, even essential to treat each space mission as a test mission and that danger lies within.

I would hope that most astronauts are keenly aware of the risk and in some respects accept that they may die. I recall that Christa McAuliffe was asked about the risks before she set off on 51L and she stated that spaceflight was pretty routine at that point. It always struck me that, if she truly believed that and that Scobee, for example, hadn’t had a frank discussion with her, that it was a great shame that she was not aware before she died.

Certainly many Orbiter commanders were very aware of the inherent danger, including John Young, Hoot Gibson and others.

Integrity was a great name for Artemis II, for me, because it’s one thing the Orbiter never appeared to have. I always had the feeling of fragility, post Challenger, whenever they launched. I do believe that going back to a capsule system is prudent.

On another subject, I do wonder how interest in Artemis will fare with such big gaps between missions. Especially as III will be an Earth orbital mission and somewhat lacking interest for Joe Public?