NASA rolls out giant rocket ahead of astronauts’ moon mission
CBC
It’s been 52 years since humans last visited the moon, but that’s about to change.
NASA’s ambitious Artemis program is ready to set a milestone with Artemis II, a mission where four astronauts — Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen and NASA astronauts Christina Koch, Reid Wiseman and Victor Glover — will swing around the moon.
The mission is currently scheduled to launch no earlier than Feb. 6.
But before the four astronauts can blast off on their historic trip, the rocket and the spacecraft need to go through some checks.
Cue the rollout of the massive 100-metre tall Space Launch System (SLS), scheduled for Saturday.
"These are the kinda days we live for," said John Honeycutt, Artemis II mission management team chair, during a Friday press conference.
“It really doesn’t get much better than this, and we’re making history.”
SLS and the Orion spacecraft in which the astronauts will live for 10 days have only been launched once, for the uncrewed Artemis I mission around the moon in 2022.
But now, they’re ready for four human passengers.
While the four won’t land on the lunar surface, they will be conducting lunar surveillance, experiments and testing out the spacecraft in preparation for Artemis III — where astronauts will walk on the moon — which is scheduled to launch no earlier than 2028.
Saturday's rollout is scheduled for 7 a.m. ET. But don't expect a race to the pad: it will take anywhere from eight to 12 hours for the five million-kilogram rocket to make the trek.
It will take about an hour for the rocket to even cross the threshold of the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB), said Charlie Blackwell-Thompson, Artemis launch director, exploration ground systems, during Friday's press conference.
The crew access arm — which is where the astronauts will walk and enter the rocket on launch day — will be retracted, which will take roughly 45 minutes.
Then, once the rocket is at the pad, all the connections will be made over the next day or so.
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