14 DAY TRIAL // Officials at the American space agency are getting closer to their objective of testing the new Orion spacecraft by next year. They set 2013 as a deadline for the first test flight of the new capsule even though the carrier rocket will only be ready in 2017 at the earliest.
The Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle (MPCV) is being developed as a four-seat, stripped-down version of the Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle that was developed under the now-canceled Project Constellation.
Most of the capsule has already been built or tested, and a full prototype is already ready. Currently, NASA researchers Dr. Anita Sengupta and Donn Liddle (pictured) are conducting a series of additional tests, in a low-speed wind tunnel at the Texas A&M University.
These scale model tests are meant to assess how Orion and its parachute system would behave under real-life conditions. With this setup, the team can see how various failures in the parachute system would affect the spacecraft and its crew upon reentering Earth's surface.