From Newsgroup: misc.phone.mobile.iphone



iPhone in space: NASA gives approval
for personal iPhones to Artemis astronauts
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"Shot on iPhone" is about to get a lot cooler, as NASA is now
allowing astronauts to carry their own smartphones aboard two
upcoming spaceflights.

It looks like NASA is getting ready to ease up on some of its
longstanding rules surrounding what can and cannot be taken on
spaceflights - and the iPhone is set to be a part of it.

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman has publicly announced that
the Crew-12 and Artemis II astronauts can carry their own
iPhones to document the journey how they want. The announcement
surfaced on X just shy of 11:00 pm ET on February 4.

NASA has strict rules surrounding what is and isn't allowed on
spaceflight. As Ars Technica points out, before this decision,
the newest camera slated to fly on the Artemis II mission around
the Moon was a 2016 Nikon DSLR, alongside GoPro cameras that
were a decade old.

This shouldn't be surprising, though. Any modern technology must
be tested, retested, and tested again before it makes the cut.
And, there are concerns about radiation exposure to the devices,
which is why the G3 PowerPC processor is still in heavy use in
orbit.

And even if it does pass the tests, that doesn't necessarily
mean it'll be given the green light. Ars Technia points out that
not only is the NASA approval process thorough, it's also
painstakingly slow.

But that seems to be changing, now. It will be interesting to
see which shots the astronauts capture on their iPhones.

Crew-12 is a NASA-SpaceX mission to bring four astronauts to the
International Space Station. The flight will return the ISS to a
full crew following a medical evacuation that took place in
early January.

The Artemis II is NASA's first crewed lunar mission in over
50 years, and is set to take place in March after a hydrogen leak
postponed the February launch. It will send four astronauts on a
10-day flyby around the moon.

This isn't the iPhone's first time in space, though. In 2011, two
iPhone 4s units flew on the final space shuttle mission. An
assortment of Apple Watches, AirPods, iPods, and iPads have been
spotted on space missions too.

And, long ago, the Macintosh Portable sent the first email from
space from the USS Atlantis on August 9, 1991.

Astronauts flying on private missions aren't subject to NASA's
restrictions, either. Both Isaacman's Polaris flight and the Axiom
missions to the space station had smartphones in tow.



<https://appleinsider.com/articles/26/02/05/iphone-in-space-nasa-gives-approval-for-personal-iphones-to-artemis-astronauts>





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