Artemis 1 - NASAs Vision for a Return to the Moon

On July 20th, 1969, the Apollo 11 lunar capsule touched down on the lunar surface. The phrase “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind” has become synonymous with this lunar exploration.

53 years after this first lunar excursion, we endeavor to journey back to the moon with NASA’s Artemis 1, the first spaceflight in NASA's Artemis program, and the first flight of the agency's Space Launch System rocket and the complete Orion spacecraft.

On the 16th of November 2022, Artemis 1 is due to launch from launch Complex 39B at the Kennedy Space Centre, after 2 previous launch attempts on the 29th of August 2022 due to a faulty reading on a redundant sensor, and on the 3rd of September 2022 due to the discovery on a hydrogen leak.

The Orion spacecraft will carry three astronaut-like mannequins equipped with sensors to provide data on what crew members may experience during a trip to the Moon. The first mannequin, called Captain Moonikin Campos (named after Arturo Campos, a NASA engineer during the Apollo program), will occupy the commander's seat inside Orion and is equipped with two radiation sensors in his Orion Crew Survival System suit, which astronauts will wear during launch, entry, and other dynamic phases of their missions. His seat also has sensors to record data on acceleration and vibration data during the mission.

The Space Launch System is an American super heavy-lift expendable launch vehicle under development by NASA since 2011. It replaces the Ares I and Ares V launch vehicles, which were cancelled along with the rest of the Constellation program, a previous program aimed to return to the Moon.

Artemis 1 will be launched on the Block 1 variant of the Space Launch System. The Block 1 vehicle consists of a core stage, two five-segment solid rocket boosters (SRBs), and an upper stage. The core stage uses four RS-25D engines, all of which have previously flown on Space Shuttle missions. The core and boosters together produce 39,000 kilonewtons of thrust at lift-off. The upper stage, known as the Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stage, is based on the Delta Cryogenic Second Stage and is powered by a single RL10B-2 engine on the Artemis 1 mission.

The mission is set to last 25 days, 11 hours, and 36 minutes over a distance of 1.3 million miles.

After reaching orbit and performing a trans-lunar injection, the mission will deploy ten CubeSat satellites and the Orion spacecraft will enter a distant retrograde orbit for six days. The Orion spacecraft will then return and re-enter the Earth's atmosphere, protected by its heat shield, and splash down in the Pacific Ocean. The mission will certify Orion and the Space Launch System for crewed flights beginning with Artemis 2. After the Artemis 1 mission, Artemis 2 will perform a crewed lunar flyby and Artemis 3 will perform a crewed lunar landing, five decades after the last Apollo mission.