The next lunar astronauts recently quarantined for a special mission: not only for rare alone time, but also to name their Orion spacecraft built by Lockheed Martin ($LMT).
When the US-Canadian quartet emerged in Houston with their two backup astronauts, they had a name: Integrity. The spacecraft could bring the Artemis II astronauts around the Moon as soon as February 2026.
Moon moniker: “Integrity” was Canadian mission specialist Jeremy Hansen’s idea to represent “peace and hope for all humankind,” NASA commander Reid Wiseman shared at a mission press conference in Houston yesterday.
Wiseman said the astronauts batted around ideas based on both NASA and Canadian Space Agency mission statements, but concluded Integrity represents “bringing together the world. We are bringing together an amazing workforce, and they are bringing together an amazing vehicle.”
Under pressure: Integrity will be the third Orion to fly in space, but the first to carry astronauts. The last Orion to make the lunar journey during the (uncrewed) Artemis I in 2022 had charring and bolt melting on the heat shield. NASA delayed the Artemis II flight date to take a closer look.
Fortunately a theoretical crew aboard Artemis I would have been fine, Orion Deputy Program Manager Debbie Korth told Payload in an individual interview. But as that kind of damage is not a good safety posture, “We need to get to the root of the cause.”
Less gassy: NASA chose to change the heat shield for Artemis III and beyond, Korth said. Their solution for Artemis II’s heat shield, which was largely ready to go before the investigation started, is a gentler reentry to stop the buildup of gases that led to damage in the last Orion.
Wiseman said his crew was never frustrated as going to the Moon is something nobody has done for a very long time—that means there’s no fixed schedule in any astronaut’s head. “When this vehicle is ready, we will get on it.”
