Morpheus during testing. Photo Credit: NASATech for Zero-G News
Spaceflight

Morpheus Completes First Test Of Hazard Avoidance System

The Morpheus team successfully completed Free Flight 10 (FF10) at the KSC SLF on Wednesday, April 2, 2014. This was the first free flight with ALHAT running in open-loop mode, imaging the Hazard Field and calculating navigation solutions in real time during flight, though not yet navigating the vehicle, i.e., Bravo GNC flew a pre-programmed trajectory as before.

Morpheus ascended to a max altitude of about 804 feet (245m), then flew forward and downward initially at a 30 degree glideslope, then leveling out some, covering a total of about 1334 feet (406.5m) horizontally in 50 seconds while diverting to a landing site location 78 feet (23.8m) from its initial target, before descending and landing on a dedicated landing pad at the front (south) of the ALHAT Hazard Field. The total flight time was ~96 sec, the longest flight to date.

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