As astronauts of the Artemis mission continue training for their upcoming journey to the Moon, NASA is busy readying the spacecraft that will carry them. The agency’s heavy-lift rocket, the Space Launch System (SLS), is getting a thorough workout to prepare it for the mission. Technicians at the Michoud Assembly Facility, located inside Kennedy Space Center in Florida, recently completed a substantial portion of a weld confidence article for the advanced upper stage of the SLS, which includes 33 engines.
That’s more than any rocket has ever flown, meaning the SLS must be incredibly reliable. If even one engine fails, the entire rocket will lose.
The rocket is scheduled to make its maiden flight in November, with a spacecraft carrying four astronauts on its second trip to the Moon since the end of the Apollo era in 1972. The Artemis mission will use the SLS and the Orion crew module, and it is expected to deliver scientists to a point about 380,000 miles beyond the Moon and then return them to Earth.
During the flight, the astronauts can perform scientific research from Orion’s living quarters and the surface of the Moon with its rocky terrain, craters, and seas of water. According to NASA, the mission could include a deep space rendezvous with another spacecraft.
For now, the crew is finishing rigorous training that includes landing Army helicopters, studying rocky terrain in areas like Iceland, and spending extended periods at the bottom of a pool. In addition, they are making a tour of NASA centers around the country and visiting Capitol Hill. The four astronauts — Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch, and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen — are preparing to learn how to operate the SLS and Orion systems.
NASA is working with commercial partners to develop a spacecraft that can land on the Moon and eventually take humans to Mars. The agency selected two companies, SpaceX and Boeing Co., 2014 to build a replacement for the shuttle, which was retired in 2010. SpaceX has already proven its Dragon capsule can carry astronauts on test flights, and Boeing is preparing for its first test flight without humans in January 2021.
In the meantime, engineers at the Michoud facility are working diligently to get the SLS ready for the November launch. A Delta 4-Heavy rocket will lift the SLS and Orion into an elliptical orbit about 250 miles above Earth; then, it will fly south-southeast from Vandenberg Air Force Base toward the Pacific Ocean. Maritime exclusion zones published in public navigation warnings suggest the mission will place its classified payload, designated NROL-91, in an orbit about 74 degrees above the equator at a latitude of about 250 miles and an inclination of 74 degrees. The same rocket will haul top secret spy satellites into orbit for the National Reconnaissance Office on future Delta 4 missions, which are scheduled to be launched this month and next.
