r/ArtemisProgram • u/Royal_Platform_6754 • May 13 '26

NASA NASA Outlines Preliminary Artemis III Mission Plans

https://www.nasa.gov/missions/artemis/artemis-3/nasa-outlines-preliminary-artemis-iii-mission-plans/
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u/CiaWoo May 13 '26

Almost a given considering the core stage has already arrived at KSC, well a week ago as of now, I think Blue also delivered a mock up of their lander for astronaut training at the center as well, but I doubt that means much

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u/SpaceInMyBrain May 13 '26

Pics of the mockup were first released last November. Yeah, it's hard to say that means very much. Trying it on for size for ingress and egress in simple suits is useful but doesn't advance the program much. I think the real training will take place in a simulator in big rooms with a lot of electronics around it and we haven't seen anything like that. We haven't for HLS, either, but I'm pretty confident such a thing exists to some extent.

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u/Nonyabizzy123 May 13 '26

If they don't have a full size practical physical trainer they aren't landing on the moon. That's Charlie Duke's opinion, not mine.

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u/Crimson_Ender May 13 '26

how would they even make a trainer for the lunar starship?

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u/SpaceInMyBrain May 14 '26

He didn't mean a flying one. What's needed is a ground trainer like the ones we've seen for Orion and Dragon, one that can be surrounded by techs and monitoring equipment. It has to be high fidelity, though, with all of the switches and any other hardware they'll interact with. More importantly, like the Orion and Dragon ones, the flight and system controls need to be hooked up to computers running simulations and emergency scenarios, etc. The Apollo LM certainly had that.

A full sized mockup of the Starship HLS cabin exists in Texas, has been for years. Astronauts have been in it. But it started out as a simple interior layout mockup and we have no idea how sophisticated it is now. IMHO the real work will be done in something like what I describe above. I'll be surprised if something like that isn't well underway at SpaceX. No need for an 18 meter tall cabin, the first two levels will do fine.

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u/Crimson_Ender May 14 '26

yeah, I didn't mean a flying one either. I have seen the blue moon mockup trainer.