SCIENCE IN THE NEWS DAILY
NASA Hopes to Test New Spaceship in 2014
from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
WASHINGTON -- There's no firm date yet, but sometime in early 2014 NASA intends to take its first major step toward rebuilding its human spaceflight
program. The milestone is the maiden test flight of its Orion spacecraft, a launch that has come into sharper relief in the three months since NASA and
manufacturer Lockheed Martin announced it.
As planned, an unmanned Orion capsule will begin its journey at Cape Canaveral and take two loops around Earth before splashing down in the Pacific Ocean.
What's now clear is that the capsule will be sent far beyond the lower Earth orbit of the International Space Station.
At its peak, Orion's orbit is expected to extend nearly 3,700 miles from Earth--the farthest a NASA spacecraft built for humans has gone since the early
1970s.
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