A brand new timelapse shows a moon rocket for astronauts under construction at NASA, ahead of the 2024 launch.
The dual rocket boosters for Artemis 2 will add oomph to NASA’s powerful Space Launch System rocket, which is able to launch 4 astronauts on a mission to the moon in 2024. Each Northrop Grumman-made solid rocket booster weighs 1.6 million kilos (720,000 kg), which NASA officials have said is the equivalent mass of 4 blue whales.
The huge boosters arrived at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center (KSC) by train in early October, following construction in Utah. Teams at KSC at the moment are specializing in putting together parts of every booster’s aft assembly – that is the part that steers the boosters as they’re flying during a launch.
“Here, the left and right aft motor segments are mated to the aft skirts, which can be followed by the installation of the aft exit cones,” NASA officials wrote Nov. 3 in a post on X, formerly Twitter.
Related: All aboard! Train tugs Artemis 2 moon rocket parts to the NASA launch center (photos, video)
As the brand new timelapse shows, moving these massive pieces across the KSC factory is not any small matter. Each bit weighs roughly 150 tons or 150,000 kg, and their immense height also requires care. The 2-story segments are between 26 to 33 feet (8 to 10 meters) high, depending on their position on the booster.
Technicians rigorously move each booster segment using the ability’s two 200-ton cranes, booster flow manager Heather Gillette said in an October Facebook livestream. After technicians position the cranes “on either side of the (booster) segment,” she added, “they rotate it (the segment) from horizontal to vertical, and so they move it over to our buildup stands.”
Each booster will include five segments, once fully assembled. The design, incidentally, is predicated on the space shuttle program’s booster — but is a bit of taller to support the larger SLS. Practically speaking, this implies technicians will put five pieces on each SLS booster, as an alternative of 4 pieces on the shuttle boosters.
The aft assembly work is underway at KSC’s Rotation, Processing and Surge Facility while other booster pieces are in storage nearby. (The aft skirts were already at KSC before the opposite booster pieces arrived, as they were made at the middle’s Booster Fabrication Facility.)
Later, all booster segments – the fully assembled aft assemblies, and the segments awaiting construction – will move to NASA’s iconic Vehicle Assembly Constructing at KSC. The rocket pieces will then see “further assembly atop the mobile launcher,” or the massive tower that supports SLS during launch.
The mobile launcher is otherwise occupied in the meanwhile with essential testing on the Launch Pad 39A, from where the mission will launch to the moon. It recently underwent a water deluge test to look at the system that safely suppresses the powerful SLS and booster shockwaves during launch. The launch sound may unduly damage equipment otherwise.
All 4 astronauts are also busy with training to familiarize themselves with the Orion spacecraft, ahead of performing a splashdown simulation test with the U.S. Navy and NASA officials towards the tip of 2023. After selection in April 2023, their training flow was scheduled to take about 18 months, meaning mission teams are formulating the procedures and hardware because the crew trains.
Artemis 2 will fly across the moon and back again to check Orion’s systems ahead of an expected moon landing by Artemis 3 in 2025 or 2026. The astronaut quartet on board Artemis 2 includes NASA commander Reid Wiseman, NASA pilot Victor Glover, NASA mission specialist Christina Koch and Canadian Space Agency mission specialist Jeremy Hansen. Glover will grow to be the primary Black astronaut to enterprise beyond low Earth orbit, while Koch can be the primary woman and Hansen the primary Canadian.