NASA's plan, messed up. The head of the space agency rules out a March launch for the Artemis II mission
One of the massive RS-25 engines of the SLS Artemis II rocket. Credit: Gregg Newton/AFP/Profimedia
NASA chief Jared Isaacman on Saturday ruled out a March launch for what is expected to be the first manned mission to the moon in more than 50 years, according to AFP.
The US space agency has noticed a problem with the helium flow of the massive Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, which “will throw off the March launch window,” Issacman said in a post on X.
“I understand that people are disappointed by this development. This disappointment is felt most by the team at NASA,” the official said.
“In the 1960s, when NASA achieved what most believed was impossible and what has not been repeated since, there were many failures,” the NASA chief added.
The institution had announced on Friday that it was aiming for March 6 as the date to launch four astronauts around the moon and back, as part of the Artemis II mission, but during the night it noticed a problem with the flow of helium in the intermediate cryogenic propulsion stage of the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, according to Reuters.
The head of NASA said that the SLS rocket and the Orion spacecraft will be returned to the Vehicle Assembly Building at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida to analyze the technical problems and make the necessary repairs.
Farthest human space travel
As part of the Artemis II mission, four astronauts will embark on a 10-day journey around the Moon, but without an actual moon landing. The crew consists of Canadian Jeremy Hansen and Americans Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch.
On Friday, NASA announced that it had overcome problems with the rocket's fuel supply in a second key exercise this week.
Artemis II is a precursor mission to NASA's planned 2028 moon landing as part of Artemis III.
If successful, Artemis II will be the first manned lunar mission since the Apollo program more than half a century ago, and it will also be the farthest manned journey in history.
Some experts claim, however, that NASA is putting the lives of the Orion crew at risk because of the heat shield. “NASA is on the verge of sending people to the moon in a capsule that not everyone thinks is safe for flight,” CNN wrote.
Mission Artemis II. Is NASA taking too much of a risk? A well-known physicist explains what the heat shield is and how it works, which must withstand 2,700 degrees
