With the Artemis-1 space mission, the United States once again conquers the Moon
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We walked on the moonwas entitled – with fifteen years in advance of the historic Apollo-11 mission – the album of the adventures of Tintin published in 1954. With the takeoff of Artemis-1 scheduled for Monday August 29, NASA can paraphrase Hergé and trumpet “We are going to walk on the moon again”.
Half a century after the end of the Apollo program, in 1972, the United States is preparing to return to the Earth’s natural satellite and Artemis-1 is the first stage of this return.
It will not yet be time for the big show since this mission, which will take off from launch pad 39B at the Kennedy Space Center (Florida), will not land on the Moon and will be carried out without a crew. The only humanoid passenger, a dummy equipped with sensors that will measure whether the acceleration on takeoff and the violent deceleration during re-entry into the atmosphere, after a six-week trip, will be well within the bearable range for human organisms.
Contenting itself with circumnavigating the Moon and then returning, Artemis-1’s main objective is to test all the systems necessary for an Earth-Moon round trip.
Starting with the rocket, a heavy launcher known as the Space Launch System (SLS), a distant successor to the Apollo program’s Saturn-5. Having experienced multiple delays, the SLS has never flown and, if all goes well, this first take-off will allow it to be certified for carrying a crew.
Second element, the Orion ship where the future lunar explorers will take place. This is divided into two parts: the manned capsule itself, which can carry four astronauts, and the service module to which four solar panels are attached. Provided by the European Space Agency, this element has the primary function of supplying the vessel with water, oxygen, electricity, and maintaining the temperature in Orion. But it also turns out to be crucial for the propulsion because it is its engines which will correct the trajectory of the machine during the trip and which will allow it to enter lunar orbit and then to come out again when the hour of return has come. Artemis-1 will therefore make it possible to test these systems in the real conditions of a space flight.
The last objective of the mission, and not the least, will consist in verifying the resistance of the heat shield of Orion during the re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere, which will take place at 40,000 km/h. At this speed, friction with the air brings the shield to a temperature of 2,800°C. Finally, the parachutes that will open before landing in the Pacific, off San Diego (California), and the recovery of the capsule by the US Navy will be tested.
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