San Antonio Express-News (Sunday)
Orion mock-up leaves space center
Test module on 5-day trip from Texas to Florida
Social media, of all things, first alerted NASA officials to a problem with the mock-up of Orion — the spacecraft being built to take humans back to the moon — on an early January morning in 2014.
The test module was being transported home via truck after undergoing tests in San Diego. Pictures posted online showed that, while agency personnel slept, an enthusiast had clambered atop the 11-foot-tall spacecraft to capture a much sought-after selfie.
Needless to say, that was the last time NASA transported a vehicle across country with the agency’s iconic “meatball” emblem on the side. So when a different Orion mock-up left the gates of Houston’s Johnson Space Center on Saturday — embarking on a five-day journey to Florida’s Kennedy Space Center where it will be launched in April to test its emergency abort system — it was devoid of all signage and symbols.
The incognito mock-up is just one of many complicated steps NASA sets in place when transporting a spacecraft across the country. Others include protecting the vehicle from road hazards, getting transportation permits for each state and tracking weather patterns to ensure a safe delivery.
With $256 million on the line — and a worldwide reminder in October of why these abort systems are so important — getting the vehi- cle to Florida in one piece is vital. On Oct. 11, the Russian Soyuz spacecraft transporting an American astronaut to the International Space Station had to abort its launch after a rocket booster failed, forcing an emergency landing.
“It’s a part of the overall attention to detail that you need to produce any of these things,” said project manager Jon Olansen. “It’s all about all the different levels of effort required.”
The haul that sat atop the semitruck pulling onto NASA Road 1 on Saturday morning was covered by an enormous purple tarp.
To those driving by, it could be anything: a tractor or a backhoe, maybe even oil and gas machinery.
“It looks like a Darth Vader helmet,” said Ken Nowak, Kennedy’s exploration ground systems logistics lead. “We try to keep it quiet. We’re all about public affairs at NASA but … it’s better to keep the public away until we get it there safely.”
The tarp serves two purposes: to provide some secrecy from the public about what is being hauled and, more importantly, to protect the mock-up Orion module from road debris or inclement weather on its 1,000-mile journey to Cape Canaveral.
The heavy-duty tarp and the shrink wrapping that covers the module underneath were chosen as the best means to protect the vehicle after numerous assessments, Olansen said.
Nowak will be in a separate car escorting the module as part of a cohort of NASA employees both in front of and behind the truck the entire trip, he said.