Tile blocks have been prefitted around the heat shield for the Orion crew module inside the Neil #Armstrong Operations and Checkout Building high bay at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in #Florida. The heat shield is one of the most critical elements of Orion and protects it and the future astronauts inside from searing temperatures experienced during reentry through Earth’s atmosphere when they return home. For Exploration Mission-1, the top layer of Orion’s heat shield that is primarily responsible for helping the crew module endure #reentry heat will be composed of approximately 180 blocks, which will be made of an ablative material called Avcoat designed to wear away as it heats up. Orion is being prepared for its #flight on the agency’s Space Launch System for Exploration Mission-1 in late 2018. #Orion is the #exploration #spacecraft designed to carry astronauts to destinations not yet explored by humans, including an asteroid and NASA’s Journey to Mars. It will have emergency abor...