NASA's Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle to go on cross country public display. Photo Credit/NASA Photo
A flight tested version of NASA’s Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle, the spacecraft that may send future explorers on missions to asteroids and perhaps Mars, will make a series of public stops as it is transported across country from the Dryden Flight Research Center in California to the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
The four-person capsule played a pivotal role in NASA’s Pad Abort 1 test on May 6, 2010, as it went airborne at high velocity from a test facility at White Sands, N. M., to demonstrate a new astronaut escape system.
The spacecraft is headed to Kennedy, where it will be housed in the Operations and Check Out Facility for further testing.
But the first stop on the over-the-road journey is the Pima Air and Space Museum in Tucson, Ariz., June 15-16. Then, it’s off to the Bullock Texas State History Museum in Austin, Texas on June 19-20.
The journey continues to the Tallahassee Challenger Learning Center in Florida on June 24-25 and finally to the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Center Complex for public display on June 29-July 4.
Just last month, NASA announced it would continue the development of the Constellation Program’s Orion crew capsule as the MPCV. The Constellation back to the moon initiative was recently cancelled.
Though many details have not been hammered out, the White House and Congress have agreed to a blue print that would couple the MPCV with a new NASA heavy lift rocket that could transport explorers to a range of deep space destinations.