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Orion (Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle or Orion MPCV) is a partially reusable crewed spacecraft used in NASA's Artemis program.The spacecraft consists of a Crew Module (CM) space capsule designed by Lockheed Martin that is paired with a European Service Module (ESM) manufactured by Airbus Defence and Space.
It was renamed the Orion Multipurpose Crew Vehicle as it would now be a single vehicle rather than the multiple designs originally proposed and launch on the Space Launch System. The Orion MPCV is the major crewed element of NASA's current Artemis Program.
Three flights of the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle are currently planned for launch in the Artemis program in the early 2020s, beginning with Artemis 1. Before Artemis was named, the flights were referred to as "Orion missions".
The "Orion 606" SM design retained the 5-meter (16 ft) width for the attachments of the Orion SM with the Orion CM, but used a Soyuz-like service module design to allow Lockheed Martin to make the vehicle lighter in weight and permitting the attachment of the decagonal solar panels at the module's midpoints, instead of at the base near the ...
Artemis II will test and demonstrate optical communications to and from Earth using the Orion Artemis II Optical Communications System (O2O). [42] The O2O hardware will be integrated into the Orion spacecraft and includes an optical module (a 4-inch [100 mm] telescope and two gimbals), modem and control electronics. [42]
Orion CM-001 used on the EFT-1 mission was built by Lockheed Martin. [9] On 22 June 2012, the final welds of the EFT-1 Orion were completed at the Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans, Louisiana. [9] It was then transported to Kennedy Space Center's Operations and Checkout Building, where the remainder of the spacecraft was completed. [10]
The Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle (Orion MPCV) is equipped with a launch escape system. Orion has several abort modes. Some of these may not use the LAS itself, but would use the second stage of the SLS, or even the Orion vehicle's own propulsion system (the Aerojet AJ10 engine) instead.
The Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle appears likely, as of December 2005, to use a ten-times reusable capsule with a replaceable heat shield. There is no limit, save for lack of engineering experience, on using high-temperature ceramic tiles or ultra-high temperature ceramic sheets on reentry capsules.