By: Catherine Wang
NASA’s agency on Thursday announced that they will not be doing another countdown testing of its latest moon rocket. But that doesn’t mean they don’t have other things on their plate! They will have to restore a hydrogen leak and roll it back to the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, which has the launch pad during late August for its first endeavor at launching.
NASA mostly completed the first part of countdown testing, called a “wet dress rehearsal.” This week NASA was finally able to fully fuel the Space Launch System rocket’s 2 stages with liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen exceeding 700,000 gallons. However, the stimulated countdown was immediately cut off with just 29 seconds left, due to the hydrogen leak.
Despite this setback, NASA was content with the outcome. “It was a great day.” Said the Artemis launch director Charlie Blackwell – Thompson after the test was conducted. “It was a very successful day, and we accomplished a majority of the objectives that we had not completed in the prior tests.”
After this week’s test, officials of NASA said they weren’t sure if they needed to do the test again, which would be the fifth attempt if conducted. Nonetheless, on Thursday NASA announced they had gathered enough data to begin with the first launch attempt with the gigantic SLS rocket, which NASA plans to use in order to allow astronauts to r to the Moon .
“NASA has reviewed the data from the rehearsal and determined the testing campaign is complete,” the agency stated. They would be transporting the rocket and its capsule (Orion) back inside the assembly building. This way they could patch up the leak and prepare the rocket and team for launching.
The first launch window is expected to occur in the middle of August 23rd and September 6th.
That launch would be known as the Artemis I. The plan is to have the Artemis I send the Orion capsule and launch it into space with no astronauts on board. Then, they would have the Orion orbit the moon. Next, in 2024, it would be followed by Artemis II which would contain 4 people on board. But they will not land on the moon, only orbit it on the Orion. Artemis I will be having its first launch in 2025, that is if every test before take-off is successful.
Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/06/23/nasa-moon-sls-rcoket-launch/