Orion Clean Room Subs Filters, Fans for Ceiling

Turns out a clean room doesn't necessarily need a roof, NASA is finding out as it tries out a design that could be assembled around the Orion spacecraft as it is prepared for launch in the Vehicle Assembly Building at Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

The key to the concept, developed by Astrotech, is two 10-foot-high walls of filter-equipped fans positioned 30 feet apart to push and pull the air in one direction across the capsule, keeping particles from settling on the spacecraft's surface.

A set of clear walls completes the box, but there is no ceiling. That's important because engineers want to use the large cranes already in the VAB to lift the Orion spacecraft and its shell into place as it is assembled on top of the Space Launch System rocket. If they have to build a clean room with its own crane, the cost would be much higher.

NASA's GRAIL Moon Twins are Joined to Their Booster

NASA's lunar-bound GRAIL twins were mated to their Delta II launch vehicle at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station's Launch Complex 17 at 8:45 a.m. EDT (5:45 a.m. PDT) today. The 15-mile (25-kilometer) trip from Astrotech Space Operations in Titusville, Fla., is the last move for GRAIL before it begins its journey to the moon. NASA's dynamic duo will orbit the moon to determine the structure of the lunar interior from crust to core and to advance understanding of the thermal evolution of the moon.

"We are about to finish one chapter in the GRAIL story and open another," said Maria Zuber, GRAIL's principal investigator, based at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. "Let me assure you this one is a real page-turner. GRAIL will rewrite the book on the formation of the moon and the beginning of us."

Now that the GRAIL spacecraft are atop their rocket, a final flurry of checks and tests can begin to confirm that all is go for launch. The final series of checks begins tomorrow, Aug. 19, with an on-pad functional test. The test is designed to confirm that the spacecraft is healthy after the fueling and transport operations. Next week, among all the upcoming final tests, reviews and closeout operations leading up to liftoff, the GRAIL team will install the launch vehicle fairing around the spacecraft.