by Tom Shafer
November 16, 2022
So, at 1:47 a.m. EST on November 16, after a forty minute or so delay during a two hour launch window, Artemis I finally lifted off of historic pad 39B at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, ending years of delay and three aborted attempts (technical issues during fueling and Hurricane Ian) as NASA ramps up its effort to return to the moon with humans in 2025. Utilizing the most powerful rockets ever built (producing a staggering 8.8 million pounds of thrust), this autonomous twenty-five day mission will test and demonstrate Orion’s ascent, orbital, descent, re-entry, splashdown, and recovery attributes. The journey to the moon will take six days, and the European service module will fly within sixty miles of the surface then use gravitational force to propel it to a retrograde orbit of about 40,000 miles, where it will stay for ten days conducting radiation experiments to aid future missions. After a six day trip home, the service module will re-enter earth’s atmosphere at a speed of Mach 32 (or 24,500 mph) — at approximately 5000℉ — and splashdown in the Pacific Ocean near California on December 11.
Of course, given my love of all things NASA, I watched the launch on my computer and snapped off — screenshotted — a few images. Enjoy!
