Training astronauts to fly to the moon

After years of delays and cost overruns, it looks like the Artemis program is finally on the right track. In April of this year, we saw the Block 1 configuration of the Space Launch System take off, and The largest rocket ever built By NASA, as part of the Artemis I test, it met expectations, so the US special agency and its partners are preparing for the next step.

Artemis II will be the first manned mission to the moon. Although astronauts will not descend to the surface of our natural satellite, they will enter its orbit on the Orion spacecraft and, after a series of activities, will return to Earth. Now, as part of that goal, NASA has just taken on a mission that it has experience with, though it hasn’t been put into action in half a century.

The challenge of training the first Artemis astronauts

We are talking about training the first Artemis astronauts. Christina Koch, Victor Glover, Reed Wiseman and Jeremy Hansen, the casting we met just over three months ago, will undergo for 18 months to a series of comprehensive tests for the long-awaited first manned mission to the Moon. Since 1972 no human has returned to visit the satellite.

But that’s not all, these four people will become the first in history to go further than anyone else, a step further than the distance traveled by members of the Apollo missions. If all goes as expected, let’s remember that in private programs there can always be more delays, Artemis II should go off at the end of 2024.

Although, as we say, calendar changes may occur, the training of Artemis II It’s been working for weeks.. Astronauts though they have years of experience They will have to learn enough about Orion and SLS. Among their obligations, we find tasks such as learning to operate and monitor the ascent and orbit systems, as well as the stages of return to Earth.

The first phase of the training program takes place at Johnson Space Center in Houston, where astronauts receive instruction on how to operate the spacecraft’s various systems. The crew will also learn how to pilot it manually and even address connectivity issues and how to respond to other potential emergencies.

Regarding the latter, since Orion will land over the ocean, the astronauts will also receive training related to survival in the water. He will also come into play Neutral Buoyancy Lab (NBL), a 12-meter-deep pool designed to simulate spacewalk in complex lighting scenarios.

the pictures: a pot

In Xataka: We have detected “organic carbon molecules” on Mars. That’s what you really mean