NASA executed the third outbound trajectory correction burn at 11:03 PM EDT on 5 April, a 17.5-second firing of Orion's thrusters that ran 25% longer than the planned 14 seconds.1 The extra 3.5 seconds consumed propellant from a finite budget. Every second of unplanned thrust on a vehicle making its first crewed deep-space flight tightens the margin available for return-leg contingencies.
The burn ended a pattern that built across previous updates: two consecutive correction burns cancelled because the OMS-E translunar injection burn had been precise enough to hold course over four days of translunar coast , . Flight Director Rick Henfling framed it plainly: "We found that Orion was on such a pinpoint trajectory that we didn't need to do the first two correction manoeuvres."2 The two cancellations were the achievement; the third burn was routine housekeeping, a final alignment before the flyby.
One correction out of three planned, a 66% cancellation rate, remains exceptional for a first flight. The two cancellations banked propellant that Orion may yet need on the return leg. The 3.5-second overshoot on the third confirms the correction, while small, was not negligible, and breaks the zero-correction narrative that had been building since Day 3.
