NASA moon rocket faces more delays

[Buster's Uncle]

NASA moon rocket faces more delays
Associated Press - 2h ago
The Washington Post


The first flight of NASA’s mega moon rocket faces additional delays after a string of failed fueling tests.



© John Raoux/AP
NASA moon rocket faces more delays


Officials said it will be challenging to meet a launch window in early-to-mid-June. The next opportunity to send an empty capsule to the moon on a test flight would be at the end of June or July.

The 30-story Space Launch System rocket has been on the pad at Kennedy Space Center for the past month. It will return to the hangar next week for valve and fuel leak repairs. The problems cropped up earlier this month, preventing NASA from filling the rocket’s fuel tanks for a critical dress rehearsal.

The rocket will probably spend weeks in the hangar before heading back to the pad for a testing redo, said launch director Charlie Blackwell-Thompson.

Managers are considering various options for getting back on track.

“It’s just a matter of what’s the right time, what’s the right way to do that,” said Tom Whitmeyer, a NASA deputy associate administrator.

NASA wants this test flight under its belt before putting astronauts onboard for the second launch, a lunar “flyaround” targeted for 2024. The third mission would attempt to land astronauts on the moon around 2025, more than a half-century after NASA’s Apollo moonshots.


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