Inside Orion — your quarterly update on the Orion program as we prepare for the 2026 Artemis II launch. As the cornerstone of NASA’s Artemis program, Orion is the only spacecraft capable of taking humans into deep space and back, making it a critical component of our nation’s space exploration efforts.

Docking Orion: Choreographing a Space Dance

Orion, NASA’s next-generation spacecraft, is designed to carry astronauts to the Moon and beyond. But to reach the lunar surface, it must first master one of the most complex maneuvers in spaceflight: rendezvous, proximity operations and docking—known as RPOD.

Exploring Commercial Services for Orion

The Orion spacecraft is humanity’s only exploration-class vehicle designed and built to take humans to the Moon, on to Mars and beyond. With NASA’s Artemis II launch on the horizon, we are examining the feasibility and requirements of providing Orion as a service.

Orion Capsule for Artemis V Arrives at Kennedy Space Center

The Orion capsule for Artemis V was shipped from NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility near New Orleans to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. The pressure vessel is Orion’s primary structure that holds the pressurized atmosphere for astronauts to live in during their mission out to the Moon and back. The pressure vessel is now being prepared for integration into an Orion crew module.

Source: NASA