Space station research contributes to navigation systems for moon voyages
Published Date: 8/30/2022
Source: phys.org
On its mission to the Moon, NASA's Orion spacecraft is designed to use NASA's Near Space Network and Deep Space Network to navigate. But if the craft loses communication with the ground or the Networks, crews can use a backup autonomous navigation system known as Optical Navigation (OpNav). This system analyzes images of the Moon or Earth taken from the spacecraft to determine its position relative to either of those two bodies.