![The booster segments that will form the two five-segment solid rocket boosters for NASA's Artemis 2 SLS rocket have arrived in Florida for processing at Kennedy Space Center. Credit: NASA](https://www.spaceflightinsider.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/KSC-20230925-PH-FMX01_0041orig.jpg)
The booster segments that can form the 2 five-segment solid rocket boosters for NASA’s Artemis 2 SLS rocket have arrived in Florida for processing at Kennedy Space Center. Credit: NASA
A journey of greater than one million miles began by rail because the solid rocket booster segments for NASA’s Artemis 2 mission made their method to Florida’s Space Coast.
The ten segments that make up each solid rocket boosters for NASA’s second Space Launch System were shipped together by train, a cross-country trek of some 2,800 miles from Corinne, Utah, to Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The journey began Sept. 19, and was accomplished the afternoon of Sept. 25.
The 2 five-segment solid rocket boosters, which collectively generate nearly all of the 8.8 million kilos of liftoff thrust for NASA’s Space Launch System, are produced by Northrop Grumman. They’re manufactured at the corporate’s facility in Utah, situated just north of Salt Lake City.
![The train with the 10 solid rocket booster segments for the Artemis 2 mission makes its way through eastern Kansas Sept. 21. Credit: Derek Richardson / Spaceflight Insider](https://www.spaceflightinsider.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/nasa-srb-train-derek-richardson-27087-655x368.jpg)
The train with the ten solid rocket booster segments for the Artemis 2 mission makes its way through eastern Kansas Sept. 21. Credit: Derek Richardson / Spaceflight Insider
Each booster segment is loaded with solid propellant. They’re about 12 feet wide and 32 feet long, weighing some 180 tons, requiring the usage of customized flatcars able to hauling as much as 200 tons of oversized equipment. Two flatcars near the front are climate controlled to maintain the 2 aft segments and nozzles at an optimal temperature of 75 degrees Fahrenheit, in accordance with Union Pacific Railroad in a 2020 press release for the Artemis 1 booster transfer.
Union Pacific said that between each automobile with booster segments is a buffer boxcar stuffed with 50,000 kilos of concrete. This is completed to distribute weight evenly across the train, help prevent the overloading of infrastructure and improve overall train handling.
The primary leg of the route began with Union Pacific from Utah to Memphis, Tennessee, where Norfolk Southern Railway took over transportation to Jacksonville, Florida.
In Jacksonville, Florida East Coast Railway took the SRB train to Titusville where the NASA Railroad took possession to move the cars across the Indian River to Kennedy Space Center for booster processing for the Artemis 2 mission.
NASA is anticipated to start stacking the boosters within the cavernous Vehicle Assembly Constructing early next yr atop the SLS Mobile Launcher. Once each 177-foot-tall booster is complete, the Boeing-built SLS core stage shall be added.
![Union Pacific locomotive No. 1943](https://www.spaceflightinsider.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/nasa-srb-train-derek-richardson-27088-655x368.jpg)
Union Pacific locomotive No. 1943 “The Spirit” leads the train carrying NASA’s SRBs in the course of the Union Pacific portion of the trek. Credit: Derek Richardson / Spaceflight Insider
The core stage of the SLS rocket is currently at NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility in Latest Orleans. Its 4 RS-25 engines and related hardware are within the means of being attached. Once complete, it can be shipped to Kennedy Space Center by the Pegasus Barge via the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic Ocean.
All remaining components of the SLS rocket for Artemis 2 — the Interim Cryogenic Propellant Stage, the Launch Vehicle Stage Adapter, and the weather of the Orion spacecraft — are at Kennedy Space Center.
Artemis 2 is anticipated to launch no sooner than late 2024, possibly early 2025. This 10-day test mission will see the Orion spacecraft with NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen fly across the Moon on a free-return trajectory before returning to Earth. After a journey of some 1.4 million miles, the capsule and crew will reenter the atmosphere before performing a parachute-assisted splashdown within the Pacific Ocean.
The 2 five-segment solid rocket boosters will only be needed for the primary 126 seconds of the mission. At that time they’ll fall away into the Atlantic Ocean.
Artemis 2 shall be the primary human mission to the Moon since Apollo 17 in 1972. It should be followed a yr or two later by the Artemis 3 mission, which is currently expected to see the primary crewed Moon landing of the twenty first century. The primary uncrewed test of the SLS-Orion system, Artemis 1, occurred in late 2022.