\u201cWe are getting just a beautiful view of the dark side of the Earth right now, lit by the moon,\u201d said Hansen. \u201cPhenomenal.\u201d<\/p>\n
Today\u2019s burn, the last major ignition of the mission, came one day after the enormous orange-and-white Space Launch System (SLS) rocket carrying the Orion capsule launched from Kennedy Space Centre in Florida for the long-anticipated journey around the moon.<\/p>\n
Now that they\u2019re moonbound, there\u2019s no turning back: the astronauts are on a \u201cfree-return\u201d trajectory, which uses the moon\u2019s gravity to slingshot around it before heading back towards Earth without propulsion.<\/p>\n
\u201cFrom this point forward, the laws of orbital mechanics are going to carry our crew to the moon, around the far side and back to Earth,\u201d said Glaze.<\/p>\n
The astronauts are wearing suits that also serve as \u201csurvival systems\u201d \u2013 in the unlikely case of a cabin depressurisation or leak, they\u2019ll maintain oxygen, temperature controls and the correct pressure for up to six days.<\/p>\n
The astronauts \u2013 Americans Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch, along with Canadian Hansen \u2013 spent their first hours in space performing checks and troubleshooting minor problems on the spacecraft \u2013 which has never carried humans before \u2013 including a communications issue and a malfunctioning toilet.<\/p>\n
Howard Hu, who oversees the Orion spacecraft, said during the briefing that the team had accomplished the objectives of tests designed to demonstrate the capsule\u2019s ability to dock with a future lunar lander.<\/p>\n
The crew did \u201ca terrific job\u201d, Hu said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m just really happy that we\u2019re headed to the moon,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Artemis 2 aims to pave the way for a moon landing planned for 2028. Photo \/ Miguel J Rodriguez Carrillo, AFP<\/p>\n
Historic journey<\/p>\n
The astronauts began the second day of their mission by playing Green Light by John Legend and Andr\u00e9 3000, Nasa said \u2013 a reference to the go signal they would soon get to fire up the engine and get moving towards the moon.<\/p>\n
They also had their first workouts of the mission on the spacecraft\u2019s \u201cflywheel exercise device\u201d \u2013 each astronaut will carve out 30 minutes a day for fitness, a bid to minimise the muscle and bone loss that happens without gravity.<\/p>\n
The 10-day Artemis 2 mission is aimed at paving the way for a moon landing in 2028.<\/p>\n
The mission marks a series of historic accomplishments: sending the first person of colour, the first woman and the first non-American on a lunar mission.<\/p>\n
If all proceeds smoothly, the astronauts will set a record by venturing further from Earth than any human before \u2013 more than 402,336km.<\/p>\n
It is also the inaugural crewed flight of SLS, Nasa\u2019s new lunar rocket.<\/p>\n
SLS is designed to allow the United States to repeatedly return to the moon, with the goal of establishing a permanent base that will offer a platform for further exploration.<\/p>\n
It was meant to take off as early as February after years of delays and massive cost overruns.<\/p>\n
But repeated setbacks stalled it and even necessitated rolling the rocket back to its hangar for repairs.<\/p>\n
The current era of American lunar investment has frequently been portrayed as an effort to compete with China, which aims to land humans on the moon by 2030.<\/p>\n
During a post-launch briefing, Isaacman said competition was \u201ca great way to mobilise the resources of a nation\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cCompetition can be a good thing,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd we certainly have competition now.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Artemis programme has come under pressure from Trump, who has pushed its pace with the hope that boots will hit the lunar surface before his second term ends in early 2029.<\/p>\n
But the projected date of 2028 for a landing has raised eyebrows among some experts, in part because Washington is relying heavily on the private sector\u2019s technological headway.<\/p>\n
\u2013 Agence France-Presse<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cWe are getting just a beautiful view of the dark side of the Earth right now, lit by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":361375,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[74,6282,24322,45290,15364,52044,190288,32878,3049,1888,54473,3011,2964,6628,9876,661,3259,7239,8036,130,3323,111,139,69,90,147,392,131,1361,1865,21419,3608,190287],"class_list":["post-361374","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-after","tag-artemis","tag-astronauts","tag-blast","tag-century","tag-commits","tag-crewed","tag-engine","tag-firing","tag-first","tag-flyby","tag-four","tag-half","tag-historic","tag-lunar","tag-major","tag-milestone","tag-mission","tag-moon","tag-more","tag-nasa","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-on","tag-science","tag-space","tag-than","tag-that","tag-today","tag-towards","tag-were","tag-zooming"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/361374","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=361374"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/361374\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/361375"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=361374"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=361374"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=361374"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}