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Artemis II Launch Day Updates

nasa.gov

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Re: Artemis II Launch Day Updates

#201

Post by TeMPOraL »

ck2 wrote: post #127
adamsb6 wrote: post #31

It is a bit chilling to watch these astronaut profiles having just read yesterday about the heat shield issues observed on the prior mission, and that this will be the first time we can test the heat shield in the actual pressures and temperatures that it will have to endure. Godspeed crew of Artemis II.

I had to watch "go at throttle up" on replay on the news in 1986 for the entire year, like almost every newscast I was only a teenager and it burned into my brain badly To this day cannot watch any launch with people onboard live

The event itself was a few years before my time, but after reading about it and eventually watching the historical news footage, the phrase "go at throttle up" also seared itself into my brain, and ever since I flinch when I hear it.

Re: Artemis II Launch Day Updates

#202

Post by runarberg »

nancyminusone wrote: post #152
runarberg wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a new generation of engineers will become fluent in what we have already discovered. We seem to have lost the technology of going to the moon we gained from Apollo. So without an actual follow-up and a tangible long term plan I suspect the exact same will happen this time around.

Yeah, that's probably an indication that we waited too long.

Or, more likely, it is an indication that manned moon missions are simply not that important, that this technology is simply not worth the cost of maintaining.

In contrast, we kept the technology of doing robotic missions in space, on the moon, and even on other planets and even asteroids (the latter two have much to improve upon though).

Re: Artemis II Launch Day Updates

#203

Post by gus_massa »

areoform wrote: post #145

There are tons of comments here that say, "this could have been a robot." And no, it really couldn't have. The best of humanity is remarkably capable as compared to the best physical machines / robots. There's a great paper called the "dispelling the myth of robotic efficiency." https://academic.oup.com/astrogeo/article-abstract/53/2/2.22... // https://lasp.colorado.edu/mop/files/2019/08/RobotMyth.pdf > “the expert e…

They are not going to land on the Moon! They are just going to sit in a can for two weeks and take photos. (OK. Tthe can is on top of a lot of burning explosive material and if they don't aim correctly they will get in a weird trajectory that will kill them. Not for the faint of heart.)

I'm not sure if they can override the commands send from Earth, but turning on and off the engines like in the Apollo XIII movie is like 100 times less accurate than the automatic orders. It's not 1969, now computer can play chess and aim to go around the Moon better than us.

Also, there is still Artemis III to test the live support equipment with humans inside, before Artemis IV that is spouse to attempt landing on the Moon.

Re: Artemis II Launch Day Updates

#204

Post by JumpCrisscross »

teraflop wrote: post #150
areoform wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because human beings are remarkably capable, especially the best and the brightest. There's a great paper called the "dispelling the myth of robotic efficiency." https://academic.oup.com/astrogeo/article-abstract/53/2/2.22... // https://lasp.colorado.edu/mop/files/2019/08/RobotMyth.pdf Yes, a robot car that drives on its own will be a better driver than most humans who text and drive, or have 400ms reaction times. Bu…

How does any of that matter for this mission, which will not be landing on the moon?

> How does any of that matter for this mission

This is a fair question. The closest answer I can get is eyes and ears onboard complement sensors.

Re: Artemis II Launch Day Updates

#205

Post by JumpCrisscross »

andrewflnr wrote: post #194
russdill wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suppose "this will be the first time we can test this slightly modified heat shield in the slightly different pressures and temperatures that it will have to endure." isn't quite as eye catching.

Yeah, that's what "untested" means in spaceflight.

> that's what "untested" means in spaceflight

Sort of. At a certain threshold, everything is untested. I’d put this closer to modified than untested—the general config was tested in Artemis I and the specific configuration in a variety of ground tests.

Re: Artemis II Launch Day Updates

#206

Post by TeMPOraL »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #204
teraflop wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does any of that matter for this mission, which will not be landing on the moon?

> How does any of that matter for this mission This is a fair question. The closest answer I can get is eyes and ears onboard complement sensors.

It's also rehearsing/testing/experience gathering for an eventual mission that will land people on the Moon again. Missions don't happen in isolation.

Re: Artemis II Launch Day Updates

#207

Post by areoform »

dekhn wrote: post #173
areoform wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because human beings are remarkably capable, especially the best and the brightest. There's a great paper called the "dispelling the myth of robotic efficiency." https://academic.oup.com/astrogeo/article-abstract/53/2/2.22... // https://lasp.colorado.edu/mop/files/2019/08/RobotMyth.pdf Yes, a robot car that drives on its own will be a better driver than most humans who text and drive, or have 400ms reaction times. Bu…

Are you referring to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troctolite_76535 ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrison_Schmitt#NASA_career )?

Yes, and more!

    > Apollo was over three orders of magnitude more efficient in producing scientific papers per day of fieldwork than are the MERs. This is essentially the same as Squyres’ (2005) intuitive estimate given above, and is consistent with the more quantitative analogue fieldwork tests reported by Snook et al. (2007).
Scientific papers are a pretty poor measure of productivity so here's another one. We know about the existence of He-3 thanks to samples brought back from astronauts on the moon. Astronauts setup fiddly UV telescope experiments on the moon, trying to set up a gravimeter to measure gravitational waves, digging into the soil to put explosive charges at different ranges for seismic measurement of the moon's subsurface... They were extremely productive. Most of what we know about the moon happened thanks to the 12 days spent on the lunar surface.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Far_Ultraviolet_Camera/Spectro...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_Surface_Gravimeter

Re: Artemis II Launch Day Updates

#208

Post by jgord »

Regardless of whether this particular mission is perfectly planned, this is precisely the kind of thing that will help humanity outgrow the dark age of war, inequality and climate mismanagement.

It is a noble endeavor - science, engineering and peaceful exploration hold the keys to our survival and prosperity.

It is also important psychologically to our survival - a reminder there is a bigger pie, that we can solve hard problems, that progress can be made, that competence and education counts, as does courage, and that we can work together for a common cause.

This is the best of America, and for a while we can be proud of the human race.

Re: Artemis II Launch Day Updates

#210

Post by nobleach »

pjmorris wrote: post #9
hghid wrote: post #7

Even though you could question the whole Artemis concept, it's still extremely exciting watching the countdown with my son. I just missed the original Apollo flights and had assumed I would never see a moon landing in my lifetime. We may well not have a landing for quite some time yet, but it's still cool to see a Moon bound rocket standing on the launchpad...

We lived ~60 miles North of the Cape when I was a young boy, and watching the Saturn V's go on the way to the moon was a forming experience.

80 miles for me! I was a Space Shuttle era kid though. Saw the Challenger disaster during my lunchtime. And then on perpetual replay for the rest of the week on WESH/WCPX/WFTV most likely. Even still, just knowing we were launching all those people into space was awe-inspiring.
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