Guest “We already knew this from the Apollo Program” by David Middleton
NASA’s “crash test dummies” Helga and Zohar, along with an array of radiation instrumentation demonstrated that the Artemis spacecraft provides adequate shielding for short duration lunar missions. The results of these measurements were recently published in Nature.
The paper is open access, with the full text freely available. Here’s the abstract:
Abstract
Space radiation is a notable hazard for long-duration human spaceflight1. Associated risks include cancer, cataracts, degenerative diseases2 and tissue reactions from large, acute exposures3. Space radiation originates from diverse sources, including galactic cosmic rays4, trapped-particle (Van Allen) belts5 and solar-particle events6. Previous radiation data are from the International Space Station and the Space Shuttle in low-Earth orbit protected by heavy shielding and Earth’s magnetic field7,8 and lightly shielded interplanetary robotic probes such as Mars Science Laboratory and Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter9,10. Limited data from the Apollo missions11,12,13 and ground measurements with substantial caveats are also available14. Here we report radiation measurements from the heavily shielded Orion spacecraft on the uncrewed Artemis I lunar mission. At differing shielding locations inside the vehicle, a fourfold difference in dose rates was observed during proton-belt passes that are similar to large, reference solar-particle events. Interplanetary cosmic-ray dose equivalent rates in Orion were as much as 60% lower than previous observations9. Furthermore, a change in orientation of the spacecraft during the proton-belt transit resulted in a reduction of radiation dose rates of around 50%. These measurements validate the Orion for future crewed exploration and inform future human spaceflight mission design.
George et al., 2024
Artemis II
Artemis II could launch as early as September 2025. The 10-day mission to orbit the Moon will be the first manned mission to the Moon since Apollo 17 in December 1972.
NASA
Artemis II will be the first flight with crew aboard NASA’s deep space exploration system: the Orion spacecraft, Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and the ground systems at Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida. During their mission, four astronauts will confirm all of the spacecraft’s systems operate as designed with people aboard in the actual environment of deep space, over the course of about a 10-day mission. The Artemis II flight test will pave the way to land the first woman and next man on the Moon on Artemis III.
The four-person crew will consist of:
- Commander Reid Wiseman
- Pilot Victor Glover
- Mission Specialist Christina Koch
- Mission Specialist Jeremy Hansen
NASA/Kim Shiflett
The SLS rocket will blast off from Kennedy Space Center Launch Pad 39B.
Reference
George, S.P., Gaza, R., Matthiä, D. et al. Space radiation measurements during the Artemis I lunar mission. Nature (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-024-07927-7
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