Artemis 1: NASA to launch the moon rocket again on Saturday
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Washington: After the failure of the first attempt to launch its giant next-generation moon rocket Artemis 1, NASA is going to give it another try on September 3 Saturday. The first try on Monday failed after certain technical issues, Reuters reported.
However, but a cloud weather forecast for Saturday gives on a 40% chance for favourable conditions to launch. Also, NASA has informed about more technical issues that requires solving before the launch.
NASA told the press that Monday's failure would add to their experience in trouble-shooting future issues. It could be considered a real-time dress rehearsal for a successful launch.
The space agency has decided to keep the 32-story-tall Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and its Orion astronaut capsule in the launch pad itself, while addressing the issues, taking it back to the assembly building.
In favourable conditions, it is expected that the rocket will lift off on Saturday at 2:17 pm local time and will send the Orion capsule for a six-week test flight around the moon and back.
This is the start of NASA's moon-to-Mars Artemis program, the successor of the 1960s-'70s Apollo lunar project.
Monday's launch failed after the agency found that one of the rocket's main-stage engines failed to reach the proper pre-launch temperature required for ignition. NASA explained that a faulty sensor in the rocket's engine section was behind the engine cooling issue. As a remedy to that, mission managers are planning to begin that engine-cooling process roughly 30 minutes earlier in the launch countdown.
But scientists also stated that the behaviour of the sensor was curious since it didn't align with the physics of the situation.