NASA's manned mission to the moon has been postponed. The astronauts still have to do a test
The ship that will take the Artemis 2 mission to the Moon Photo: Michael Cain Jr. / ddp USA / Profimedia
NASA announced on Friday that it will postpone by a few days the date originally planned for the launch of the Artemis 2 space mission, during which American astronauts will fly around the moon for the first time after a break of over 50 years, reports AFP, quoted by Agerpres.
Due to unfavorable weather conditions, the US space agency had to postpone a final major test of its SLS lunar rocket, thereby pushing back its launch schedule, NASA officials explained on Friday.
The first possible release window will therefore open on Sunday, February 8, not on February 6, as originally planned. This new date will coincide with the Super Bowl, the final of the American football championship, an important and highly publicized event in the United States.
However, it is not certain that NASA will attempt to launch the SLS rocket that very day, as the last technical test of the rocket has not yet been performed.
Astronauts of the Artemis 2 mission that will go to the moon entered mandatory quarantine before the launch
The latter, which constitutes a kind of dress rehearsal, must allow the verification of the fact that everything is in order to be able to carry out the launch. But with a cold snap affecting much of the United States, the final test has been postponed until next week.
Depending on how it goes, NASA will announce the date it thinks it will be able to actually launch this roughly 10-day mission, which will involve three Americans and one Canadian.
Fourteen launch windows, between February 8 and April 30, are currently being considered by NASA, which will also have to launch a manned mission to the International Space Station (ISS) in the same interval.
Named Crew-12, that mission, in which the French astronaut Sophie Adenot will also participate, will be able to be launched starting from February 11, but it also risks being postponed, depending on the launch of the Artemis 2 mission, a NASA official stated in a press conference on Friday.
