NASA is investigating a minor odor reported aboard the Orion spacecraft Saturday morning while the Artemis II crew continues toward a planned lunar flyby.
Orion deputy program manager Debbie Korth said flight teams reviewed power and heater telemetry and found no anomalies. A similar smell was reported during ground testing, she said, so investigators are considering mechanical sources such as off-gassing from tape or other materials. The team is still early in its work and does not believe the condition is hazardous.
The upcoming flyby will give the crew views of far-side lunar regions never seen by human eyes. NASA science officials noted that Apollo missions were timed for near-side illumination, so some features on the Moon’s far side remained unobserved by astronauts. Areas recently imaged by robotic probes will now be visible to the Orion crew. The mission will also include an approximately 53-minute solar eclipse roughly an hour after Earthrise.
On mission day two NASA released a high-resolution selfie of Orion taken by a camera mounted on one of the spacecraft’s solar array wings during a routine external inspection.
Planned flight day four activities include a deep-space handling test at 9:10 p.m. ET, when Victor Glover will take manual control of Orion to evaluate spacecraft response to maneuvers far from Earth. Controllers also scheduled a 24-hour acoustics test to better understand cabin sound levels.
Crew wake-up came around 12:35 p.m. ET to the song Pink Pony Club by Chappell Roan. NASA released new downlinked images showing Commander Reid Wiseman and Mission Specialist Christina Koch looking back at Earth from Orion’s windows as the spacecraft travels toward the Moon.