With a launch test set for Thursday, NASA employees are prepping the Space Launch System that will take astronauts to the moon in 2024.
Engineers and technicians at NASA are in the final stages of prepping the Artemis I mission, which will launch a rocket to the Moon in May. On March 17th, the mission begins with a “wet dress rehearsal” that will transport the spaceship from the “Vehicle Assembly Building” to “LaunchPad 39B,” four miles away.
There, at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, NASA scientists will conduct tests that include a launch countdown… but neither the SLS, or the Orion spacecraft that sits on top of the rocket, will blast off. Should all go according to plan, there will be a launch in May that will send the unmanned spaceship to the moon. The unmanned test flight will take 25 days, roundtrip, reaching the Moon on the 4th day, and returning back to Earth around 20 days after launch.
This will pave the way for a future manned mission, Artemis II, slated to launch in 2024. And if that mission is successful, Artemis III would take more astronauts to the Moon in 2025. The first mission, which NASA employees have been gearing up for this month, will test the new Space Launch System (SLS) and the Orion capsule, both built under government contract by Elon Musk’s company, SpaceX.
Until Next Time,
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