Azernews.Az

by Alimat Aliyeva

The U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has authorized the crew of the Orion spacecraft to perform a key maneuver that places the vehicle on a trajectory toward the Moon, AzerNEWS reports.

To complete the maneuver, Orion must fire its main engine for 5 minutes and 49 seconds. The engine is capable of producing up to 2.7 tons of thrust, allowing the spacecraft to precisely adjust its path for the lunar journey.

The Space Launch System (SLS) rocket carrying Orion as part of the Artemis II mission launched on Wednesday at 18:35 local time from the John F. Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

The crew includes NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Christina Koch, and Victor Glover, along with Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen. They are expected to fly around the Moon at a distance of about 8,000 km from its surface before returning safely to Earth.

The mission is scheduled to last 10 days and marks a major step forward in humanity’s return to deep space exploration. The last crewed mission to the Moon took place in December 1972 during Apollo 17, making Artemis II the first mission in over 50 years to send astronauts into lunar orbit.

If successful, the crew will travel farther from Earth than any humans since the Apollo era, setting a new milestone for human spaceflight. Notably, this mission will also test critical systems needed for future lunar landings, including those planned under the broader Artemis program, which aims to establish a sustainable human presence on the Moon—and eventually pave the way for missions to Mars.

Interestingly, Artemis II is also significant from a historical perspective: it will be the first time a woman and a person of color fly on a mission to the Moon, highlighting NASA’s efforts to make space exploration more inclusive in the 21st century.