Once landed, it will be left in the water for two hours, much longer than if astronauts were on board, in order to collect data.
“We will see how heat is absorbed by the capsule and how this affects the temperature inside“, detailed Jim Geffre, responsible for Orion at NASA.
Then divers will attach cables to it in order to tow it to the interior of the ship, the rear of which will be partly submerged. The water will then be pumped, allowing the capsule to be slowly deposited on a support provided for this purpose.
Operations are expected to take four to six hours from the time of landing.
The ship will then take the road to San Diego, on the American west coast, where the capsule will be disembarked a few days later.
In total, the spacecraft will have traveled more than 2.2 million kilometers in space since its takeoff on November 16 during the first flight of NASA’s new mega rocket, SLS.
Orion flew by the Moon only some 130 kilometers from its surface, and ventured up to more than 430,000 km from our planet.