NASA to Host Virtual Viewing of Orion Spacecraft Drop Test

Engineers will drop a 14,000-pound test version of the Orion spacecraft into the Hydro Impact Basin at NASA’s Langley Research Center’s Landing and Impact Research Facility in Hampton, Virginia, at 1:45 p.m. EDT Tuesday, April 6.

The test will air live on NASA Television, the NASA app and the agency’s website, and will livestream on multiple agency social media platforms, including the Facebook channels for Orion and Langley.

Participants include:

Debbie Korth, Orion Crew and Service Module manager, NASA’s Johnson Space Center
Jacob Putnam, data analyst, Langley
The public may ask questions on social media using #AskNASA.

Media may send questions to Kristyn Damadeo at [email protected].

This series of drop tests began March 23 to finalize computer models for loads and structures prior to the Artemis II flight test, NASA’s first mission with crew aboard Orion. Artemis II will carry astronauts around the Moon and back, paving the way to land the first woman and next man on the lunar surface and establish a sustainable presence at the Moon under the Artemis program. The current test series builds on previous tests and uses a configuration of the crew module based on the spacecraft’s final design.