posted 05-04-2012 07:22 AM               

Orion Exploration Flight Test-1 insignia

Lockheed Martin Space Systems will conduct the Orion Exploration Flight Test-1, or EFT-1, in 2014 under contract to NASA.

The test will launch NASA's Orion spacecraft, without a crew, to an altitude that has not been achieved by a craft intended for human flight since the Apollo lunar landing missions.

The EFT-1 flight will take Orion to an altitude of more than 3,600 miles, more than 15 times farther away from Earth than the International Space Station. Orion will return home at a speed almost 5,000 miles per hour faster than any current human spacecraft. It will test the kind of return that will be required when astronauts come home from voyages beyond low Earth orbit. As Orion reenters the atmosphere, it will endure temperatures almost 2,000 degrees F., higher than any human spacecraft since astronauts returned from the Moon.

posted 09-22-2014 03:33 PM               

Below is a graphic showing:

• an AB Emblem patch with a green band found in September 2014 at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex (the tag on the reverse shows it was made in the USA in June 2014);
  
• an AB Emblem patch received directly from NASA (the tag identifies it was made in Taiwan in November 2012); and
  
• a third variant as displayed on AB Emblem's own web store (though I do not know yet if it is the same patch you receive when you order).

posted 11-04-2014 09:57 PM               

The shape of the EFT-1 mission patch represents the shape of the Orion capsule. The Orion capsule is depicted as leaving Cape Canaveral and orbiting the patch. The nose cone and Orion capsule are depicted sitting atop the Delta IV Heavy launch vehicle.

The NASA logo, ULA Delta IV logo and 5th SLS red stars represent the support efforts. The mission partners names are inscribed around the border. Orion's Belt is depicted on the top of the patch.

posted 04-07-2019 05:56 PM               

Prior to the inaugural flight of the Orion Space Capsule, dubbed Exploration Flight Test 1 (EFT-1), the HSC-8 "Eightballers" participated in four detachments to prepare for the actual launch. This included two CM drop tests at the Army's Yuma Proving Grounds in Arizona, in which the capsule was released from an Air Force C-17 at 35,000 feet. Following two land drops, NASA conducted two Underway Readiness Test (URT) events near San Clemente Island, off the coast of southern California. One URT event was conducted from USS San Diego (LPD 22) and the other onboard USS Anchorage (LPD 23).