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How Otto Engineering in Carpentersville is making NASA's Mars mission possible

When Navy Capt. Scott Altman joined NASA in 1995, he thought he would eventually be the first human on Mars.

Though he never made it that far, the former astronaut completed four space flights and helped design the Orion spacecraft, built to send a crew deeper into space than ever before. He has since made it his goal to inspire the next generation to carry out the Mars mission.

Also playing a role in the exploration program is a team from Otto Engineering, the Carpentersville manufacturer chosen to create switches for the spacecraft's command module.

The dozens of employees assigned to that project got a glimpse at the significance of their work Thursday when Altman, a central Illinois native, stopped by Otto to tour the facility.

“It was really a thrill to work on Orion and set the stage for our next-generation vehicle that's going to take us to the moon and set the stage for going to Mars,” Altman told the Otto team. “The work you're doing is making that possible.”

Otto Engineering has made parts for other space-related projects, including the Apollo spacecraft and the space shuttle program, General Manager David Ross said. That didn't make company leaders any less thrilled when NASA awarded them the Orion contract about two years ago.

“We're incredibly excited,” Ross said. “To think that the product that we're making here in Carpentersville, Illinois, will be on a craft that's going to go to Mars — you can see how excited everybody is to be part of that.”

The engineers, in particular, were “ecstatic” to be involved in such a high-profile project, Ross said. The intricate, high-performance switches are challenging to make and have to be tested extensively.

“They have to work,” he said. “There's no ifs, ands or buts about it.”

For Altman, seeing where the control module switches are made brings him full circle. His work on Orion started during the early stages of the exploration program and continued even after leaving NASA in 2010. The company he works for now helps to assemble the Orion vehicle, he said.

Altman was inducted into the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame this year and is a veteran of four space shuttle missions, including the last two service missions to the Hubble Space Telescope. Flying into space is an “incredible adventure,” he told Otto employees, and there's no feeling like being inside a spacecraft as it launches.

Sending a crew to Mars requires a whole new mindset because of the length of the mission — 2½ years — and the planet's distance from Earth, Altman said. While previous flights rely heavily on the mission control team on the ground, he said, Orion's crew and the vehicle's capability likely will need to be more autonomous.

The mission, however, could be a steppingstone to traveling even farther into space, such as the asteroid belt, Altman said.

“Great things are just over the horizon. We've got to do the homework first (and) build the right components,” he said, pointing to the importance of Otto's work for Orion. “It is critical to our space program.”

  Former NASA astronaut Scott Altman visits Otto Engineering in Carpentersville on Thursday. Otto has been contracted to make the switches for the control module for the Orion spacecraft, which is built to take astronauts to Mars. Rick West/rwest@dailyherald.com
  Carl Radke, prototype supervisor at Otto Engineering in Carpentersville, shows off a five-axis milling machine making a product that will go into the control module of NASA's Orion spacecraft. Rick West/rwest@dailyherald.com
Cmdr. Scott Altman, right, waves to NASA employees and family at the Kennedy Space Center before the final mission to the Hubble Space Telescope in 2009. Associated Press
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