The Orion spacecraft blasted off toward the moon today at 1:47 AM. EST (0647 GMT) from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, driving the first rocket of the agency’s Space Launch System into orbit. A few hours later, the rocket’s upper stage fired its engine to send the Artemis 1 Orion capsule on its journey around the moon. That’s where tonight’s live webcast comes in. Astrophysicist Gianluca Masi of the Virtual Telescope Project in Ceccano, Italy, will attempt to broadcast live telescope views of Orion online in a live event scheduled for 10:30 p.m. EST (0330 Nov 17 GMT). You can watch it for free in the window above or directly from the Virtual Telescope Project website (opens in a new tab). Artemis 1 launch photos: Amazing views of NASA rocket’s moon debut Live updates: NASA’s Artemis 1 moon mission
A view of Earth as seen from the Artemis 1 Orion capsule, for more than 9 hours of flight on November 16, 2022. (Image credit: NASA TV) “The launch of Artemis 1 is much more than going to the moon again. It is the beginning of a new era,” Masi wrote in a statement. “Because of the historical importance of this event, we decided to try something that has never been done before (to our knowledge): we will share live images, online, of the Orion spacecraft on its way to the moon after launch.” It is not certain that the Virtual Telescope Project will be able to locate the Orion spacecraft. First the weather in Italy must cooperate, and then Masi must be able to spot the spacecraft, which is a relatively small, fast-moving target in the vacuum of space, with his telescope. “We will do our best to show you the Artemis 1 Orion spacecraft on its way to the moon as soon as it is visible from Italy,” Masi wrote. “We will assume the launch and trajectory data provided by JPL Horizons / Solar System Dynamics services, properly fed into our robotic telescopes to track this extremely challenging target in the best possible way.” Email Tariq Malik at [email protected] (opens in new tab) or follow @tariqjmalik (opens in new tab). Follow us @Spacedotcom (opens in new tab), Facebook (opens in new tab) and Instagram (opens in new tab).
