By Andy Pasztor
NASA plans to launch an initial, unmanned version of its Orion
capsule from Florida's Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on Thursday
morning, marking the first test flight of a spacecraft the U.S.
hopes to rely on for human exploration of the solar system in
coming decades.
Featuring two orbits and scheduled to last less than five hours,
the voyage is slated to take Orion some 3,600 miles above the
earth, more than 10 times higher than the trajectory of the
international space station. But it won't resolve long-standing
questions about how future Orion missions will be paid for or even
where they would go.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration officials describe
the 11-foot long Orion, with its advanced onboard life-support
systems and radiation shields, as the primary vehicle to transport
future astronauts to asteroids and eventually to Mars, perhaps by
the late 2030s. Yet so far, NASA's plans have failed to generate
the international support, congressional consensus and public
excitement back home that the agency expected.
It is unclear how NASA's budgets--already stretched by the
international space station--over the next decade will cover
Orion's development as well as a steady launch rhythm. Building and
testing separate vehicles able to touch down at destinations is
likely to cost billions of additional dollars. Debate also
continues to simmer on Capitol Hill and elsewhere about whether
astronauts should first take Orion near the moon to perfect
propulsion, fueling, life-support and other essential
technologies.
So no matter how well Thursday's debut goes, Orion illustrates
the mercurial, sometimes roller-coaster nature of U.S. manned space
efforts better than any other recent program.
Perched on top of a heavy-lift Delta IV booster, the Air Force's
most powerful rocket system, Orion is slated to lift off around 7
a.m. Eastern time. If all goes as planned, the test will be the
first time since 1972, when Apollo 17 returned from the moon, that
a spacecraft built to carry astronauts will venture beyond
low-earth orbit.
The major goals of the test flight will be to assess how well
Orion's navigation and electronics systems stand up to radiation,
the performance of its heat shield and the way its parachutes are
able to withstands re-entry speeds.
Built by Lockheed Martin Corp. and currently costing the
National Aeronautics and Space Administration about $1 billion a
year, NASA casts Orion as the key to deep-space ventures.
Write to Andy Pasztor at andy.pasztor@wsj.com
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