NASA Drops its Orion Capsule into a Million-Gallon Pool

Most of us would be happy with a Slip n’ Slide, but for the good folks at NASA that’s just not enough. NASA has made a 115 foot long, 90 foot wide pool filled with about a million gallons of water to test dropdown for the Orion capsule. Here’s more from SlashGear:

NASA doesn’t just hoist its spacecraft up and cut the cord, mind: instead, there’s precise control over the orientation at which it hits the water’s surface, including how much vertical and horizontal impact velocity it’s carrying.

Orion is no stranger to the HIB. Indeed the first tests of the mockup capsule took place all the way back in mid-2011, though at the time it was a far cry from the version of the spacecraft NASA is working on today. For a start it was significantly heavier then: around 22,000 pounds.

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