Nasa spacecraft, designed to take man to Mars, rolled out ahead of debut test flight

A Nasa spacecraft designed to one day fly astronauts to Mars has been rolled out of its processing hangar at the US space agency's Kennedy Space Centre in Florida to be prepared for a debut test flight in December.

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The Orion capsule sits on top of the service module as it is moved from the Operations & Checkout Building to the Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility at Kennedy Space Centre. Photo: Reuters

Published: 9:15pm, 12 Sep 2014Updated: 4:01am, 13 Sep 2014

A Nasa spacecraft designed to one day fly astronauts to Mars has been rolled out of its processing hangar at the US space agency's Kennedy Space Centre in Florida to be prepared for a debut test flight in December.

"This is a pretty historic moment for us," Scott Wilson, Nasa's Orion production operations manager, said as workers prepared to move the capsule to a fuelling depot. "This marks the end of the assembly process."

An unmanned version of the gumdrop-shaped Orion capsule, which has been under construction for three years, is due to launch aboard a United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy rocket on December 4 from nearby Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.

United Launch Alliance is jointly owned by Lockheed Martin and Boeing.

Orion will be flown to an altitude of about 5,800km from the earth, 14 times farther away than the International Space Station.

The Orion spacecraft is set for a test flight in December. Photo: AP

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