NASA began fueling its new moon rocket for liftoff on Saturday in a test flight that must go long before astronauts board.
For the second time this week, the launch team began loading nearly 1 million gallons of fuel into the 98-meter rocket, the most powerful ever built by NASA. Monday’s attempt was halted by a bad engine sensor and a fuel leak.
As the sun rose, an overpressure alarm sounded and tank operation was briefly halted, but no damage occurred and the effort resumed, NASA Launch Control reported.
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NASA wants to send the crew capsule on top of the rocket around the Moon, pushing it to the limit before the astronauts board the next flight. If the five-week demonstration with test dummies is successful, astronauts could fly around the moon in 2024 and land there in 2025. People last walked on the moon 50 years ago.
Forecasters expected generally favorable weather at Kennedy Space Center, especially toward the end of the two-hour afternoon launch window.
At the same time, the rocket’s chief engineers expressed confidence in tougher fuel lines and procedural changes.
On Monday, a sensor indicated that one of the four engines was too hot, but engineers later verified that it was actually cool enough. The launch team planned to ignore the faulty sensor this time and rely on other instruments to make sure each main engine cooled properly.
Before ignition, the main engines must be as cold as the liquid hydrogen fuel flowing through them at minus-250 degrees Celsius. If not, the resulting damage could cause an abrupt engine shutdown and an aborted flight.
Mission managers accepted the additional risk posed by the engine problem, as well as a separate problem: cracks in the rocket’s insulating foam. But they acknowledged that other issues could cause another delay.
That didn’t stop thousands of people from stranding the coast to watch the Space Launch System’s rocket blast off. Local authorities were expecting massive crowds due to the long Labor Day holiday weekend.
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The $4.1 billion test flight is the first step in NASA’s revamped Artemis lunar exploration program, named after Apollo’s twin sister in Greek mythology.
Twelve astronauts walked on the moon during NASA’s Apollo program, the last time in 1972.
Years behind schedule and billions over budget, Artemis aims to establish a sustained human presence on the Moon, with crews eventually spending weeks there. It is considered a training ground for Mars.
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