Nasa said the inaugural flight of its new moon rocket is weeks away after another dangerous fuel leak forced launch controllers to call off their second attempt this week to send a crew capsule containing test dummies into lunar orbit.
Nasa said the inaugural flight of its new moon rocket is weeks away after another dangerous fuel leak forced launch controllers to call off their second attempt this week to send a crew capsule containing test dummies into lunar orbit.
The previous attempt at launching the 322-foot Space Launch System rocket, the most powerful built by Nasa, was also troubled by hydrogen leaks, though they were smaller. That was on top of leaks detected during countdown drills earlier in the year.
After the latest setback, mission managers decided to haul the rocket off the pad and into the hangar for further repairs and system updates. Some of the work and testing may be performed at the pad before the rocket is moved.
Either way, several weeks of work will be needed, according to officials.
With a two-week launch blackout period looming in just a few days, the rocket is now grounded until late September or October. Nasa will work around a high-priority SpaceX astronaut flight to the International Space Station scheduled for early October.
Nasa administrator Bill Nelson stressed that safety is the top priority, especially on a test flight like this where everyone wants to verify the rocket’s systems “before we put four humans up on the top of it”.
