Azernews.Az

By Alimat Aliyeva

NASA was forced to end a critical fueling test of its giant Artemis 2 rocket early Tuesday morning, delaying the mission to send astronauts around the Moon by at least a month. Now, as the sun rises on the big orange launch vehicle, the space agency is trying to clarify what went wrong - and much of what it’s saying sounds all too familiar, Azernews reports, citing foreign media.

The fueling test for NASA's Artemis 2 Space Launch System (SLS) rocket began late Saturday (Jan. 31) and continued until Tuesday morning. Known as a “wet dress rehearsal,” the test simulates a full countdown, putting both the rocket and ground teams through the procedures to fuel the SLS with the more than 700,000 gallons of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen required for launch.

Tanking operations initially went smoothly on Tuesday (Feb. 2) after mission managers gave the “go” to begin. However, hydrogen leaks detected at the SLS tail service mast umbilical quick disconnect on the launch platform forced technicians into troubleshooting mode for much of the afternoon.

If this sounds familiar, it’s because Artemis 1 experienced hydrogen leaks at the same location during its wet dress rehearsal three years ago. Those leaks led to three separate rollbacks to NASA's Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) over six months before Artemis 1 finally launched.

Artemis 1 lifted off in November 2022, carrying an uncrewed Orion spacecraft on a month-long mission around the Moon and back.

With Artemis 2, NASA will test Orion’s ability to sustain astronauts in deep space. The crew will include NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, and Christina Koch, along with Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen, who will fly on a 10-day mission around the far side of the Moon. This flight will validate Orion’s systems in preparation for Artemis 3, NASA’s planned mission to land astronauts back on the lunar surface.

“We really did learn a lot from the Artemis 1 mission, and we implemented many of those lessons yesterday during the wet dress rehearsal,” said Lori Glaze, acting associate administrator of NASA’s Exploration Systems Development Mission Directorate, during a post-test press conference on Tuesday.

The Artemis 2 mission will mark the first time since Apollo 17 in 1972 that humans will orbit the far side of the Moon — nearly 55 years later.