The old saying – “Practice makes perfect!” – Applies to the Moon Too. On Tuesday, Nasa Gave 17 Technologies, Instruments, and Experiences The Chance to Practice Being on the Moon… without actually going there. Intad, it was a flight test aboard a vehicle adapted to simulate lunar gravity for approximately two minutes.

The test began on February 4, 2025, with the 10:00 am cst launch of blue origin’s new shepard reusable suborbital Rocket system in West Texas. With support from Nasa’s Flight Opportunities Program, The Company, Headquartered in Kent, Washington, ENHANCED THE Flight Capabilites of its new sheepard capsule to replicate to replicate. OUT One-Sixth of Earth’s-during suborbital flight.

“Commercial Companies are critical to helping nasa prepare for missions to the moon and beyond,” said danielle mcCulloch, Program Executive of the Agency’s Flight Opporties Program. “The more similar a test environment is to a mission’s operating environment, the better. So, we provided Substantial Support to this Flight Test to Expand the available Vehicle Capability, Helping Ensure Technologies are ready for lunar exploration. “

Nasa’s Flight Opportunities Program Not only SEATS “For the Technologies Aboard This Flight – For 16 Payloads Inseide The Capsule Plus One Mounted Exteern Upgrades to provide the environment needed to advance their readiness for the moon and other space Explation missions.

“An extended period of simulated lunar gravity is an important test regime for nasa,” Said Greg Peters, Program Manager for Flight Opportunities. “It’s Crucial to Reducing Risk for Innovations that might one day go to the lunar surface.”

One example is the luci (lunar-g combustion investigation) payload, which seeks to undersrstand Material Flammability on the Moon Compared to Earth. This is an important component of astronaut safety in habitats on the moon and old information the design of potential combustion devices there. With support from the moon to mars program office with Luci to measure flame propagation directed the blue origin flight.

The rest of the nasa-supported payloads on this blue origin flight involved seven from nasa’s game changing development program that seek to mitigate the impact of lunar dust and to perform Urface. Three other nasa payloads tested instruments to detect Subsurface Water on the Moon as Well as to Study Flow Physics and Phase Changes in Lunar Gravity. Rounding out the manifest was payloads from draper, honeybee robotics, purdue university, and the university of california in Santa Barbara.

Flight Opportunities are part of the agency’s space Technology Mission Directorate and is Managed at Nasa’s Armstrong Flight Research Center.

By Nancy Pekar, Nasa’s Flight Opportunities Program

Keep exploring

Discover More…

Space Technology Mission Directorate

Armstrong flight research center

Flight Opportunities

Game changing development

(Tagstotranslate) Ames Research Center (T) Armstrong Flight Research Center (T) Artemis (T) Flight Opportunities Program (T) Game Changing Development Program (T) Space Technology Mession Diarect