Nichols Martin
NASA’s Redstone Test Center has concluded hot-fire tests of an Aerojet Rocketdyne-built jettison motor for the Orion spacecraft’s launch abort system.
The motor generated over 40K pounds of thrust for nearly two seconds on Oct. 16 in Huntsville, Ala., marking the motor’s final hot fire test, the space agency said Thursday.
The testing’s completion verifies the readiness of the motor to support Artemis II, a manned lunar flyby mission scheduled for a 2022 launch.
The jettison motor works to separate the LAS from the spacecraft for parachuted crew landing. The LAS also features two other motors: an attitude control unit for capsule steering and an abort motor that undocks Orion’s crew module from the rocket.
Aerojet Rocketdyne built the jettison motor under Lockheed Martin, Orion’s prime contractor.
