The world has always been beset by problems of high-tech spacecraft failing to function properly. And it’s now been revealed that NASA’s Orion spacecraft, designed to take humans into deep space for the first time, was constantly at risk of breaking down during tests as it was being designed.
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s success rate in getting risky craft into space varies between 86 percent and 76 percent. That’s bad news for the space agency, which was recently tasked with getting humans back to the moon in the 2030s.
But as Project Orion–NASA’s vehicle that Orion will eventually replace–was going through its sometimes bumpy development path, NASA had plenty of time to try and fix any problems, including electric components that have prevented the spacecraft from fully functioning.
The Orion spacecraft, being built by Lockheed Martin, is the first time a spacecraft has been designed to carry humans beyond Earth orbit in over 40 years.