During a status update on the Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft's deployment to Kennedy Space Center's Launch Pad 39-B for a wet dress rehearsal on Thursday, NASA mission management ruled out April for the Artemis I launch.
While the 322-foot-tall rocket is scheduled to arrive at the launch pad on March 17 at 6 p.m., NASA will require a month or more for testing and a return to the Vehicle Assembly Building before approving a launch attempt for the uncrewed journey to the moon.
"We continue to evaluate the May window, but we're also recognizing that there's a lot of work in front of us," Tom Whitmeyer, deputy associate administrator for exploration systems development at NASA headquarters in Washington, said during a virtual news conference per Space.com.
The next launch windows are May 7-21, June 6-16, and June 29-July 12.
According to Whitmeyer, most work within the VAB is completed ahead of the wet dress rollout, including the final significant hardware testing, which included the placement of explosives aboard the vehicle that they would utilize in the case of an aborted launch.
This NASA photo released on January 6, 2020, shows NASA's powerful new rocket, the Space Launch System (SLS), which will send astronauts a quarter-million miles from Earth to lunar orbit at the Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans, Louisiana. - The agency is committed to landing American astronauts, including the first woman and the next man, on the Moon by 2024. Through the agency's Artemis lunar exploration program, we will use innovative new technologies and systems to explore more of the Moon than ever before. On January 1, 2020, NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine tweeted: "Making progress! The massive @NASA_SLS core stage is moving to Building 110 at the Michoud Assembly Facility in Louisiana. There it will be readied for the Pegasus barge and its trip to @NASAStennis. Thank you to the @NASA team for working through the holidays!"
NASA to Roll Out SLS Rocket at Cape Canaveral on March
NASA said per Alabama Local that the Space Launch System rocket would be rolled to a launch pad at Cape Canaveral by mid-March for a vital "wet dress rehearsal" of the fuelling system.
This significant phase fills the rocket's main tank with liquid fuel in a test that signals the space agency's confidence that the rocket's long-awaited inaugural flight is approaching. After the fuelling test, the gasoline will be drained and SLS will be wheeled back to the assembly facility for more inspections.
Technical and even astronomical difficulties, however, must still be aligned. They include the position of the moon, which the rocket's upper stage must fly around during this initial test flight before landing with a crew. Given those intangibles, a launch in May or June seems most plausible.
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The wet dress rehearsal entails transferring the large rocket from the Vehicle Assembly Building to the launch tower on its mobile launcher. The fuel will be emptied from SLS when engineers have fully fuelled the rocket and return to the assembly facility for final tests.
The Artemis program is a series of missions to land a crewed spacecraft on the Moon. The missions will involve several historic firsts, such as the first woman and person of color on the Moon, and several scientific objectives. However, before the crewed Artemis 2 mission, the uncrewed Artemis 1 must make it past the Moon and return.
NASA Shares Steps Before Official Artemis 1 Launch
The final procedures in preparation for the uncrewed Artemis 1 test flight, which is scheduled for this spring, were reported by NASA. The immediate focus is on the Orion spacecraft's "wet dress rehearsal" slated for mid-March. The Artemis program eventually hopes to land people on the Moon for the first time this century.
For the next test, Gizmodo said the Orion spacecraft and the massive Space Launch System rocket would NASA roll out to the launchpad at Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida.
For years, NASA has been testing and retesting these aspects, including Orion's splashdown tests for its return to Earth. Following a disaster late last year, NASA confirmed that SLS engine testing had gone satisfactorily earlier this week.
Mike Bolger, NASA Exploration Ground Systems program manager, said they expect the transit to begin on March 17 at 6:00 p.m. EST. These operations (known as "rollout") would typically begin around midnight, but the NASA crew wanted more people to be able to witness the massive task in real-time.
Before the transit, NASA technicians will remove 20 enormous platforms-ten on each side of the rocket, each basketball court size. Engineers can reach various areas of the spaceship thanks to the platforms.
The wet dress rehearsal will begin after SLS and Orion arrive at the pad. Experts will load the rocket with fuel-liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen-and the crew will conduct a countdown before launching. The team will next detank the truck and park it on the pad.
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