Artemis II: Nasa plans crewed Moon mission for February BBC

I haven’t heard any rumours that Artemis II will be delayed. Artemis I had tons of rumours that ended up being true. Bodes well for the mission. It will be really cool to see humans go beyond LEO again.

>The mission was overwhelmingly successful, though there were issues with the heatshield as the spacecraft re-entered the Earth’s atmosphere. These have since been addressed.

’tis but a scratch. /s

The new heat shield design of a crewed spacecraft unexpectedly shed large chunks on that shield’s one and only uncrewed test/qualification flight. And, though everyone (including NASSA in the Orion press conference last December) seems to forget it, the service module separation bolts embedded within the heat shield melted, likely past their design margins. Both were pretty serious.

The heat shield erosion problem has not been properly addressed for Artemis II. NASA’s analysis found that the unexpected cracking and erosion of the heat shield was caused by hot gases buikding uo within the heat shield, because the design was not permeable enough. Not only did NASA decide to *not* redesign the heat shield for Artemis II to be more permeable, they kept a heat shield on the Artemis II Orion which is even less permeable than the one that flew on Artemis I. (So, assuming NASA’s analysis is correct, the Aetemis II heat shield is objectively worse than the one that flew on Artemis I.) NASA believes, based on their analysis and ground testing (which failed to predict the problems on Artemis I) that modifying the reentry trajectory for Artemis II will sufficiently mitigate the gas buildup.

The heat shield was also not the only problem with Orion on Artemis I. There were two dozen power system disruptions (traced to radiation), all unexpected based on ground testing. Quoting page 11 of a [report last year from the NASA Inso
Pector General](https://oig.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/ig-24-011.pdf) (emphasia added–deviance normalized):

>NASA engineers have implemented and tested flight software changes and operational workarounds to help address these power disruption events should they occur during Artemis II. The crew and flight control teams will also receive training on how to respond to these anomalies and return the system to normal functioning. However, without a verified permanent hardware fix addressing the root cause prior to the Artemis II mission, the risk is increased that these systems may not operate as intended, leading to a loss of redundancy, inadequate power, and potential loss of vehicle propulsion and pressurization during the first crewed mission. **The Orion Program has accepted this increased risk for Artemis II.**

Furthermore, Artemis II, taking crew around the Moon, will be the first time Orion’s full life support system will be used in space. (Life support problems also contirbuted to delays of Artemis II, and again ground testing does not inslire a lot of confidence. A critical design flaw, that caused valve failures in the CO2 removal system, got past testing and into the assembled Artemis II Orion. Fortunately, perhaps because of the other delays, the problem was caught in component testing for the Artemis III Orion.) Yes, on Artemis II Orion will spend a day in Earth orbit checking out the life support and other systems before heading tiward the Moon. However, that time will mostly be spent in a highly elliptical orbit with a ~24 hour period instead of LEO, so it could be as long as that 24 hours before they could splash down in the event of a critical failure.

Artemis II is a hodgepodge of minimally flight tested vehicles, non-flight tested systems, and halfway/band-aid solutions to known problems. Orion really should be getting another uncrewed flight to test/verify proper fixes, and a crewed LEO test flight. It is absurd that we are doing less flight testing today than with Apollo during the space race, with its dubious safety standards. Speaking of questionabke safety standards, with Artemis II, SLS will be launching crew on only its second ever launch. NASA’s minimum standards for launching critical *uncrewed* spacecraft (e.g., Euripa Clipper) require the launch vehicle to have had at least 3 consecutive successful launches. Even Saturn V got two uncrewed test flights.