Uploaded December 2014 | Updated September 2026, 36 minutes ago
collectSPACE.com — Orion is NASA's new spacecraft built to carry humans, designed to enable journeys to destinations never before visited by astronauts, including an asteroid and Mars. On this uncrewed test flight, Exploration Flight Test-1, Orion will test systems critical to crew safety as it travels farther into space than any spacecraft built for humans has traveled in more than 40 years.
During the 4.5-hour flight, Orion will orbit Earth twice, covering more than 60,000 miles (96,600 kilometers) and reaching an altitude of 3,600 miles (5,800 kilometers) on the second orbit. (The International Space Station orbits Earth at an altitude of approximately 260 miles, or 420 kilometers.) That altitude will allow the spacecraft to return through the atmosphere at a speed of 20,000 mph (32,000 kph), which will generate temperatures near 4,000 degrees Fahrenheit (2,200 degrees Celsius) on Orion's heat shield. Those temperatures – about 80 percent as hot as Orion would experience returning from lunar orbit – will provide the most challenging test currently possible.
Video credit; NASA
collectSPACE.com — Orion is NASA's new spacecraft built to carry humans, designed to enable journeys to destinations never before visited by astronauts, including an asteroid and Mars. On this uncrewed test flight, Exploration Flight Test-1, Orion will test systems critical to crew safety as it travels farther into space than any spacecraft built for humans has traveled in more than 40 years.
During the 4.5-hour flight, Orion will orbit Earth twice, covering more than 60,000 miles (96,600 kilometers) and reaching an altitude of 3,600 miles (5,800 kilometers) on the second orbit. (The International Space Station orbits Earth at an altitude of approximately 260 miles, or 420 kilometers.) That altitude will allow the spacecraft to return through the atmosphere at a speed of 20,000 mph (32,000 kph), which will generate temperatures near 4,000 degrees Fahrenheit (2,200 degrees Celsius) on Orion's heat shield. Those temperatures – about 80 percent as hot as Orion would experience returning from lunar orbit – will provide the most challenging test currently possible.
Video credit; NASA
![Air Force X-37B OTV-4 Landing [Profile]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/EXyKldFZh-4/mqdefault.jpg "Air Force X-37B OTV-4 Landing [Profile]
http://collectSPACE.com — The Air Forces X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle mission 4 landed at NASA s Kennedy Space Center Shuttle Landing Facility May 7, 2017. Managed by the Air Force Rapid Capabilities Office, the X-37B program is the newest and most advanced re-entry spacecraft that performs risk reduction, experimentation and concept of operations development for reusable space vehicle technologies.
Read more: http://www.collectspace.com/news/news-050717a-x37b-otv4-space-plane-landing.html
Video credit: U.S. Air Force")
