Orion (Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle)

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The crew vehicle for Artemis. A pressurised crew module 5.03 m in diameter carries up to four astronauts on deep-space missions, mated to the European Service Module built by Airbus and supplied by ESA, which provides main propulsion, power from four solar array wings, thermal control and consumables. Return from the Moon means re-entering at roughly 11 km/s, about forty per cent more energy than a return from low Earth orbit; this is absorbed by a 5 m AVCOAT ablative heat shield — the largest ever built — flown on a skip-entry profile that dips into the atmosphere, rises, then re-enters to shorten the range to the recovery zone. Artemis I returned with unexpected loss of charred material from that shield; a NASA investigation concluded in December 2024 that gases generated inside the Avcoat could not vent during the skip entry, and NASA chose to fly Artemis II on the existing shield with a modified entry trajectory.

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