Artemis II Astronauts Practice Opening The Palka Side To The Orion Aircraft

One of the NASA astronauts while testing the Orion hold (photo: dock. NASA)

JAKARTA All astronauts for the Artemis II mission visited Lockheed Martin in Littleton, Colorado to carry out further training. This time, the four crews were asked to train with the hold of the Orion plane.

Palka is a very important part to study. While in Lockheed Martin's training room, astronauts are required to open and close the side hatch on the Orion module so that they have no trouble operating it.

In fact, the four astronauts will not open and close the hold independently during the Artemis II mission. The system control team at the Kennedy Space Center will close the hold at the back before the plane takes off the launch pad.

When the plane lands back to Earth, precisely in the Pacific Ocean, the recovery team will open a side hatch to help the entire crew get out of the plane. Even so, astronauts must know how to close and open the hatch in a state of emergency.

NASA explains that the side hold can be opened using a manual gear box system. However, this method cannot be done quickly. Therefore, astronauts are also taught how to open the hatch with other mechanisms.

"In an emergency, the hold has a release mechanism containing a small pyrotechnic device (explosive) that releases the hook pin in the hold instantly, so that the hold can open quickly," NASA said in its official broadcast.

Previously, NASA had announced four astronauts who were selected as crews of Artemis II. They are NASA astronauts Victor Glover, Christina Koch, and Reid Wiseman, as well as Canadian Space Agency (CSA) astronaut Jeremy Hansen.

In addition to training the four astronauts on how to operate the side hatch, NASA is also training two backup crews, namely NASA astronaut Andre Douglas and CSA Astronaut Jenni Gibbons. When a crew is unable to fly, this reserve crew will replace it.