NASA's Orion slingshots around moon, longer trip coming up
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- NASA's Orion capsule reached the moon, grabbed onto its gravitational pull and did a slingshot around it.
It's the first time a capsule has visited the moon since NASA's Apollo program 50 years ago.
Orion's onboard cameras captured a view of the approaching moon and a very small Earth floating in the distance. The blue orb then disappeared as NASA's capsule and crew of test mannequins began a 34-minute journey around the backside of the moon.
NASA says Orion buzzed 80 miles above the moon's surface. It then fired up its orbital maneuvering system engine, leveraging the moon's gravitational pull to catapult into a new, distant orbit.
About an hour later, Orion soared above Tranquility Base, where Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on July 20th, 1969.
"This is one of those days you've been thinking about and dreaming about for a long, long time," said Zebulon Scoville, NASA flight director.
Next Monday, Orion will travel about 270,000 miles from Earth, the farthest trip in NASA's history for a spacecraft intended for astronauts.
"NASA looks at the Artemis program as a really a two-phase sort of thing," Bill Harwood, CBS News space analyst, said. "One, test technology and procedures in order to eventually go to Mars. And two, look for resources you can mine on the moon to make exploration easier and lower cost."
Orion blasted off last week atop the SLS, the most powerful rocket NASA has ever built. If this first Artemis mission is successful, astronauts are slated to head to the moon as early as 2024.
NASA says the rocket that sent the Orion capsule into space caused more damage to the launch pad than expected. The liftoff thrust was so powerful that it tore off the blast doors of the elevator.
Orion's three-week journey is set to end Dec. 11 with a splashdown near San Diego in the Pacific Ocean.