Human beings are about to return to the moon soon – but not as soon as we expected.
Yesterday (3), NASA announced it would delay the Artemis II mission that will send four astronauts on an orbit around the moon.
The delay is due to issues that happened during a critical fuel test of its enormous rocket.
Member of NASA’s Emergency Response Team (ERT) stands guard at night in front of the Artemis II Space Launch System (SLS) on the launch pad at Kennedy Space Center in Merritt Island, Florida. pic.twitter.com/9GgfYmwVEo
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NBC News reported:
“Mission managers were conducting an elaborate launch day walkthrough, known as a ‘wet dress rehearsal’, at Kennedy Space Center in Florida when engineers detected leaking hydrogen at the base of the Space Launch System rocket. NASA was forced to end the test a little after midnight ET, with around 5 minutes and 15 seconds remaining in the simulated launch countdown.
Shortly after 2 a.m. ET on Tuesday, NASA announced it would forgo February’s launch window for the Artemis II mission around the moon, which extended from Friday through Feb. 11, to allow teams to review data and conduct another wet dress rehearsal. It said it will now aim for March ‘as the earliest possible launch opportunity’.”
Hellbound and Down 