After a first failed attempt earlier this week, NASA will try again this Saturday to launch its megarocket towards the Moon, for a test mission that should launch its new flagship program, Artemis, fifty years after the last Apollo flight. .
Tens of thousands of spectators hope that their wait will be rewarded with an impressive spectacle: the orange and white SLS rocket, which will make its maiden flight from Launch Pad 39B at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, is the most powerful in the world.
Takeoff is scheduled for 2:17 p.m. local time, or 8:17 p.m. French time, and remains possible for the next two hours if necessary.
The team is “ready”
Weather conditions are 60% favorable at the start of this shooting window, then gradually improve to 80%.
“Our team is ready, they are better every time,” Jeremy Parsons, manager of ground equipment at the space center, said Friday. If the weather and material conditions are met, “it is clear that we will take off.”
In case of a new impediment on Saturday, the takeoff could possibly be rescheduled for Monday or Tuesday. Then it will be necessary to wait until September 19 at the earliest, due to the positions of the Earth and the Moon.
A first test mission
The purpose of this unmanned mission, called Artemis 1, is to verify that the Orion capsule, on top of the rocket, is safe to carry astronauts in the future.
Thanks to this new ship, the US space agency intends to reconnect with distant human exploration, with the Moon being 1,000 times further away than the International Space Station.
Above all, NASA intends this time to establish a lasting human presence there, in order to make it a springboard for a trip to Mars.
The trip is expected to last about six weeks in total. Orion will venture up to 40,000 miles behind the Moon, farther than any other habitable spacecraft to date.
A succession of technical problems during the first launch attempt
In the middle of the long weekend in the United States, up to 400,000 people are expected to admire the launch, especially from the surrounding beaches. A host of astronauts also made the trip, including Frenchman Thomas Pesquet.
Filling the rocket’s tanks with its cryogenic fuel – about three million liters of liquid hydrogen and oxygen – should begin first thing in the morning.
A leak had been noted at this stage on Monday, before an engine cooling problem ended up canceling the launch. Since then, NASA has worked to solve these problems.
New astronauts on the Moon in 2025?
After this first mission, Artemis 2 will carry astronauts to the Moon in 2024, without landing there. An honor reserved for the crew of Artemis 3, in 2025 at the earliest. NASA then wants to launch about one mission per year. This time, NASA wants to allow the first person of color and the first woman to walk on the Moon.
It will then be about building a space station in lunar orbit, called Gateway, and a base on the surface of the Moon. There, NASA wants to test the technologies necessary to send the first humans to Mars: new suits, a vehicle to move around, possible use of lunar water…
According to NASA chief Bill Nelson, a multi-year round trip to the red planet could be attempted in the late 2030s.
Source: BFM TV
