NASA delays Artemis lunar mission until March

Cape Canaveral. NASA said yesterday it is now aiming for a March launch of its new moon rocket after facing maddening fuel leaks during a crucial test the previous day.

The space agency indicated in a statement that the delay in the launch will allow “teams to review the data and carry out a second general rehearsal” before the flight test.

The leaks — reminiscent of the rocket’s delayed debut three years ago — emerged just a couple of hours after Monday’s all-day refueling operation at the Kennedy Space Center, and cast doubt on how soon the astronauts could lift off.

NASA said the four astronauts assigned to the flight will be removed from their nearly two-week quarantine. He added that they will re-enter this “approximately two weeks” before the next launch window for the trip around the Moon.

The agency gave no indication of an official launch target in March, saying teams need to first “fully review the test data, mitigate each issue, and return to testing.” Before yesterday’s postponement, the earliest NASA could have launched Commander Reid Wiseman and his crew to the Moon was Sunday.

On Monday, launch controllers began loading the 98-meter rocket with supercold hydrogen and oxygen at noon. More than 2.6 million liters were to flow into the tanks and remain on board for several hours, mimicking the final stages of a real countdown.

Hydrogen leaks

But excessive hydrogen quickly accumulated near the base of the rocket. Its loading stopped at least twice as the launch team scrambled to fix the problem using techniques developed during the Space Launch System countdown in 2022. That first test flight was plagued by hydrogen leaks before finally taking off without a crew.

NASA also noted in its statement that delays were incurred in shutdown operations during the test, as well as recurring audio loss issues in ground team communications.

The four astronauts assigned to the mission – three Americans and one Canadian – monitored the critical dress rehearsal from nearly 1,000 miles away in Houston, home of the Johnson Space Center.

The space agency has only a few days in any month to launch the rocket, and the extreme cold had already shortened the February launch window by two days.

Delayed by the cold snap, countdown clocks began ticking Saturday night, giving launch controllers a chance to go through all the motions and deal with any lingering rocket problems. The clocks were scheduled to stop half a minute before reaching zero, just before the ignition of the engine.

The nearly 10-day mission will send astronauts beyond the Moon, around the satellite’s mysterious dark side and then directly back to Earth, with the goal of testing the capsule’s life support and other vital systems. The crew will not enter lunar orbit or attempt to land on the moon.

The last time NASA sent astronauts to the Moon was during the Apollo program of the 1960s and 1970s. Artemis aims for a more sustained lunar presence, and Wiseman’s crew would set the stage for future landings by other astronauts.