NASA’s SLS rocket mission is targeted for liftoff in 2024.
REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, ALBAMA — In a brief status update posted Tuesday (11/1/2022), NASA officials wrote that the agency and its manufacturing partners have made great progress in crafting the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket for Artemis 2, a manned mission orbiting the moon. . The mission is targeted to take off in 2024.
Testing and manufacturing of SLS parts are also underway for the moon landing mission Artemis 3, now scheduled no earlier than 2025, and its successor Artemis 4, the agency said.
“The Space Launch Systems team not only built one rocket, but built multiple rockets for future SLS exploration and flight missions beyond the initial Artemis launch,” John Honeycutt, SLS program manager at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama, said in a statement. update, quoted from Space, Thursday (13/1/2022).
“Mission Artemis 1 is the first in a series of increasingly complex missions that will expand our presence on the moon. The unprecedented power and capability of the SLS rocket will send missions farther and faster throughout the solar system,” Honeycutt added.
In July, the Artemis 2 SLS (ICPS) interim cryogenic propulsion stage was the first to arrive in Florida, near its launch site at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center (KSC). ICPS is now completing final preparations at its United Launch Alliance (ULA) and Boeing facilities for delivery to KSC, NASA officials said. The ICPS for the Artemis 3 SLS is under construction at the ULA plant in Decatur, Alabama. The platform will be used to propel the Orion crew capsule towards the moon.
Meanwhile, NASA officials said boosters and RS-25 engines for the Artemis 2 and Artemis 3 rockets are in the final stages of assembly. The Artemis 2 engine is ready to be integrated with the SLS core stage at NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans, while the Artemis 3 engine is in preparation at the Aeroject Rocketdyne facility at NASA’s Stennis Space Center in Mississippi. (Aerojey Rocketdyne is the main contractor of the RS-25.) Construction of the RS-25 on missions beyond Artemis 4 is ongoing.
Also, engineers with aerospace firm Northrop Grumman have completed casting the motor booster segment for the Artemis 2 and Artemis 3 in Utah and have begun work on the segment for the Artemis 4, NASA officials said. In the update, NASA also demonstrated progress on elements such as the cone-shaped launch vehicle stage adapters for Artemis 2 and 3, along with manufacturing panels for universal stage adapter test articles for future missions.
Artemis is NASA’s manned lunar exploration program, which aims to establish a sustainable human presence on and around the moon by the late 2020s. The space agency is currently aiming to land astronauts on the lunar surface no sooner than 2025, on the Artemis 3 mission. The mission was originally targeted for 2024 under President Donald Trump’s administration.
But it was pushed back for a variety of reasons, from funding issues to technical issues with elements like the spacesuit to the now-resolved federal lawsuit over the Artemis Human Landing System contract, awarded to SpaceX in April 2021.
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