Orion Spacecraft Outfitted with Largest Ever Heat Shield

Just one more step closer to the return of manned spaceflight for the US, NASA and Lockheed Martin engineers recently installed the largest heat shield ever constructed on the crew module of the agency’s Orion spacecraft.

Made of a coating called Avcoat, and unlike the reusable Space Shuttle tiles, this re-entry coating actually burns away keeping the extreme 4000 degree temperatures of returning to the Earth’s atmosphere safely away from the crew module. While in space, the material has to be protected from the extreme cold temperatures with a silver reflective tape.

The space agency is still aiming for the first launch of the next generation of spacecraft for this upcoming December 2014.

“It is extremely exciting to see the heat shield in place, ready to do its job,” said Mark Geyer, Orion Program manager at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. “The heat shield is such a critical piece, not just for this mission, but for our plans to send humans into deep space.”

During the inaugural and unmanned flight of Orion, which will be designated Exploration Flight Test-1, engineers will be able to gather information about the heat shield’s ability to protect the capsule and its crew.

As the test flights help engineers further refine the spacecraft, they will be able to continue to ready the vehicle for its ultimate missions to carry astronauts to asteroids and Mars.