An engine-cooling problem forced NASA to postpone for at least four days the debut test launch of the colossal new rocketship it plans to use for future astronaut flights back to the moon, more than 50 years after Apollo's last lunar mission.
The launch was called off two minutes after the targeted launch time, as the 32-story-tall, rocket and its capsule awaited liftoff. Photo: AFP / Joel Kowsky / NASA
Senior NASA officials declined to set a precise time frame for retrying a launch of the mission, dubbed Artemis I.
But at a news briefing hours after the aborted countdown they said a second launch attempt was still possible as early as Friday, depending on the outcome of further data review.
If engineers can resolve the issue on the launch pad in the next 48 to 72 hours, "Friday is definitely in play," Michael Sarafin, NASA's Artemis mission manager told reporters.
The mission calls for a six-week, uncrewed test flight of the Orion capsule around the moon and back to Earth for a splashdown in the Pacific.
The planned journey will mark the kickoff of NASA's highly vaunted moon-to-Mars Artemis programme, the successor to the Apollo lunar missions of the 1960s and '70s.
A problem surfaced just ahead of Monday's planned launch of the Space Launch System (SLS) as its fuel tanks were being filled with super-cooled liquid oxygen and hydrogen propellants at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida.
Launch teams began a "conditioning" process to chill the engines sufficiently for liftoff but one of the four main engines failed to cool down as expected, NASA said.
The launch was called off two minutes after the targeted launch time, as the 32-story-tall, rocket and its capsule awaited liftoff.
Late-hour launch postponements are routine in the space business, and Monday's was not in itself an immediate indication of a major setback for NASA or its primary contractors, Boeing Co for SLS and Lockheed Martin Corp for Orion.
"We don't launch until it's right," NASA chief Bill Nelson said in a webcast interview just after the liftoff was scrubbed. "It's just illustrative that this is a very complicated machine, a very complicated system, and all those things have to work. And you don't want to light the candle until it's ready to go."
Still, the delay was a disappointment to thousands of spectators who had gathered on the shores around Cape Canaveral, with binoculars in hand.
Vice President Kamala Harris had just arrived at the space centre, joining a throng of dignitaries and invited guests attending the event, shortly before the scrub was called.
Thousands of spectators had gathered on the shores around Cape Canaveral. Photo: AFP / Gerardo Mora /Getty Images
The voyage is intended to put the 5.75-million-pound vehicle through its paces in a rigorous demonstration flight, pushing its design limits, before NASA deems it reliable enough to carry astronauts in a subsequent flight targeted for 2024.
Due to the complexity of the issue that came up on Monday and constraints on how long a rocket is permitted to remain at a launch tower before blastoff, the spacecraft could end up being rolled back to its vehicle assembly building if trouble-shooting and repairs drag on for too long.
Such a move would involve a more extended delay than a few days or a week. But NASA officials said they were not ready to make that call yet.
Five decades since people last on Moon
Billed as the most powerful, complex rocket in the world, the SLS represents the biggest new vertical launch system the US space agency has built since the Saturn V rocket flown during Apollo, which grew out of the US-Soviet space race of the Cold War era.
If the first two Artemis missions succeed, NASA is aiming to land astronauts back on the moon, including the first woman to set foot on the lunar surface, as early as 2025, though many experts believe that time frame is likely to slip by a few years.
The last humans to walk on the moon were the two-man descent team of Apollo 17 in 1972, following in the footsteps of 10 other astronauts during five earlier missions beginning with Apollo 11 in 1969.
The Artemis program seeks to eventually establish a long-term lunar base as a stepping stone to even more ambitious astronaut voyages to Mars, a goal that NASA officials have said will probably take until at least the late 2030s to achieve.
The program was named for the goddess who was Apollo's twin sister in ancient Greek mythology.
SLS has been under development for more than a decade, with years of delays and cost overruns. But the Artemis program also has generated tens of thousands of jobs and billions of dollars in commerce.
One issue cited by NASA officials last week as a potential show stopper for Monday's launch was any sign during rocket fueling that a newly repaired hydrogen line fitting had failed to hold. NASA officials said on Sunday they were also eyeing a potential, but minor, helium leak in launch pad equipment.
Although no humans will be aboard, Orion will be carrying a simulated crew of three - one male and two female mannequins - fitted with sensors to measure radiation levels and other stresses that real-life astronauts would experience.
- Reuters