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NASA’s New Moon rocket exploded Monday as it ignited the final make-or-break test that will determine whether astronauts can lift a lunar rover.
The launch team began loading the 98-meter rocket with supercooled hydrogen and oxygen at noon at Florida’s Kennedy Space Center. More than 2.6 million liters had to be poured into the tanks and remained on board for several hours, mimicking the final stages of the actual count.
But within hours of the day’s launch, an excess of hydrogen was found near the bottom of the rocket. Hydrogen loading was temporarily halted, with only half of the main platform filled.
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Loading resumed about an hour later, but stopped briefly until resuming after 4 p.m.
The launch team struggled to work around the problem using techniques developed during the only Space Launch System (SLS) rocket launch three years earlier. That first test flight was marred by hydrogen leaks before it finally took off.
The crew — Jeremy Hansen of the Canadian Space Agency and NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch — attended the critical dress rehearsal 1,600 kilometers from Houston, home of the Johnson Space Center. They have been in quarantine for a week and a half awaiting the results of the exercise count.
The all-day operation will determine when they can blast off on the first manned lunar mission in more than half a century.
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Weather delay
Running back two days due to extreme cold, NASA set its countdown clocks half a minute before reaching zero, before the engine ignited.
The clocks began winding down Saturday night, giving launch controllers a chance to go over all the maneuvers and deal with any lingering rocket problems. Hydrogen leaks put the first SLS rocket in a pod for months in 2022.
If the fuel demonstration can be successfully completed on time, NASA could launch Commander Wiseman and his crew to the moon as soon as Sunday.
The rocket must fly by February 11, or the mission will be canceled by March. The space agency has only a few days each month to launch a rocket, and extreme cold has shortened the February launch window by two days.
The nearly 10-day mission will send astronauts past the moon, through the mysterious far side and straight to Earth, with the goal of testing the capsule’s life support and other critical systems. The crew will not go into lunar orbit or attempt to land.
NASA last sent astronauts to the moon during the Apollo program in the 1960s and 1970s. The new Artemis program aims for a more continuous presence on the Moon, and Wiseman’s crew developed a platform for future lunar landings by other astronauts.