A historic moment.. The Orion capsule returns to Earth after a 26-day trip around the moon

Arab Weather - NASA's Orion spacecraft landed yesterday, Sunday (December 11), in the Pacific Ocean at the conclusion of the "Artemis 1" mission, after a journey that lasted approximately 26 days, in which it traveled 1.4 million miles in space, during which it orbited the moon.

The Orion capsule made a "perfect" landing.

The capsule touched down in the sea off the Mexican island of Guadalupe at 17:40 GMT. The advanced Orion capsule turned into a ball of flame when it entered the Earth's atmosphere at a high speed of approximately 40,000 kilometers per hour, and it endured a very high temperature of 2,800 degrees Celsius. The landing was controlled and slowed down by parachutes that opened upon landing, down to a speed of 30 kilometers per hour when it touched the water.

"The ocean landing was perfect," said Melissa Jones, a vehicle recovery operations officer who has been training with NASA for years. This is a video of the stage of entering the atmosphere (the image on the left is a simulation of what happens in the real scene):

The main objective of the mission was to test the vehicle's heat shield before risking the lives of astronauts in future missions. Given the high speed, the vehicle needs a strong heat shield so that it does not suffer damage due to the high heat resulting from the great friction with the particles of the atmosphere.

When the spacecraft landed and 11 parachutes opened to help it reduce its speed when hitting the water, NASA made sure that the heat shield succeeded in doing its job. However, engineers must first test the capsule before judging the shield's success.

After the capsule fell into the ocean, near the Mexican island of Guadalupe, recovery teams moved on to collect images that could be fed into post-flight analysis.

A historic moment and a milestone in space travel

"Historic moment and milestone in space travel," German astronaut Alexander Gerst wrote on Twitter. "Mankind once again has a spacecraft that can carry people beyond Earth's orbit, into space, to explore the Moon and Mars," he added. He congratulated the participating teams for this "fantastic performance".

The success of this mission, which lasted a little more than 25 days, is of great importance to NASA, which has invested tens of billions of dollars in the American "Artemis" program to return to the moon aimed at preparing for a future trip to Mars.

It is expected that NASA will soon announce the names of the astronauts selected for the “Artemis 2” mission, which is scheduled for 2024, as it is expected to orbit around the moon without landing on it. As for the "Artemis 3" mission, officially scheduled for 2025, it will allow landing on the southern side of the moon, where water ice is recorded.

Apollo 17 - the last time a man landed on the moon

The last time humans landed on the moon was on December 11, 1972, at 19:54 GMT. The Apollo 17 crew of Gene Cernan and Harrison Schmidt spent just over three days on the surface before returning to Earth, and the image (below), recreated by image processor Andy Saunders, shows the footprints of astronauts on the moon. In the absence of winds and erosion factors on the ground, these marks remained unchanged until now, despite the passage of half a century.

You may also be interested in: Why does NASA decide now to return to the lunar surface after an absence of 50 years?

NASA Partnerships on the Artemis Mission

NASA's partner in the mission, the European Space Agency (ESA), followed the capsule's return to Earth, where it provided "ESA," the thrust unit that propelled Orion to, around, and back from the Moon.

In the video, the European Propulsion Module separated from Orion about 20 minutes before it re-entered Earth's orbit, and was shattered as it fell toward Earth over the South Pacific Ocean.

Europe will continue to supply more thrusters for future Orion missions as a means of securing seats for European astronauts alongside their American colleagues.

The propulsion engine for the next manned Artemis mission has been delivered to NASA. The rover, which will be used in the Artemis 3 lunar landing mission, is now being assembled in Germany and is at an advanced stage.

And while NASA does not yet have a landing system on Earth. Such a system is being developed by the American businessman Elon Musk. Musk is building a giant rocket and crew-carrying vehicle he calls Starship. It is scheduled to make its first flight over Earth in the coming months.

And there will be a joint trip between Musk and NASA, and in the third trip, Artemis 3, Orion will meet with Starship near the moon, where the Musk vehicle will transport astronauts to the surface of the moon.

The return of "Orion" coincided with the launch of the UAE mission to explore the moon

By the time Orion returned from the Moon on Sunday, two spacecraft were heading in the opposite direction.

Japan's iSpace has dispatched the Hakuto-R robotic lander. If it lands safely, it will send a small rover from the United Arab Emirates called Rashid , and a similar small robot from the Japanese Space Agency, to investigate the properties of lunar soil.

For more: The launch of the "Rashid" spacecraft in the first Emirati mission to explore the moon

NASA also sent its own payload with the Japanese rocket, called the Lunar Flashlight, a suitcase-sized spacecraft that will orbit the moon and use infrared lasers to search for water ice deposits.