The megarocket was paraded to the launchpad in Cape Canaveral, Florida, on Thursday evening, and not just for a flashy photo-op a la the Oscars red carpet.
Artemis I is the first in a series of deep space exploration voyages that could lift off as early as May. NASA will send a crew on the next mission, Artemis II, but the upcoming launch won't include astronauts.
At its Kennedy Space Center launchpad, the fully assembled rocket, known as the Space Launch System, with the Orion spacecraft on top, will undergo a so-called wet dress rehearsal because the crucial test involves filling the rocket with liquid fuel. NASA will not set a date for the first lunar mission until the loading and simulation is complete.
The launch of the 322-foot rocket began at 5 p.m. It is expected to arrive at the launch site at about 4 a.m. Friday. The dress rehearsal will begin on April 3.
The last time NASA showed its largest rocket, it was a grand display. During a call with reporters in February, Mike Bolger, exploration ground systems program manager, said that when the Space Shuttle was hauled to the launch pad, it was transported under the cover of darkness.
NASA's moon rocket begins the 4-mile trek to the launchpad for a wet dress rehearsal. Credit: NASA / Joel Kowsky
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The agency took advantage of a spectacular Space Coast sunset for the road trip, which will be less than 1 mph.
Tom Whitmeyer, associate administrator for exploration systems development, said in a press briefing on Monday that this is a very different vehicle than what we normally see in Florida.
The rocket's height makes it stand out. The Statue of Liberty and Big Ben are comparable in size to the rocket used for the Apollo missions.
"It just catches your breath."
It catches your breath.
The journey from storage to the launchpad is about four miles. It will take around 11 hours for the megarocket to travel down the path on a crawler transporter, a machine reminiscent of a Star Wars mobile desert fortress.
The team will connect the mobile launcher to utilities once the rocket is docked at the launch pad. The next step is a meeting to assess the health and status of the rocket. The core and upper stages of the rocket will be loaded with liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen.
The team can practice walking and fueling during the wet dress rehearsal. It will take about eight hours to fill the megarocket's tanks. The Space Shuttle took 2.5 hours.
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A so-called "scrub" is a cancellation, and NASA engineers will practice it. The space agency can call off a launch at any time for a variety of reasons. A Space Shuttle launch was once delayed because a woodpecker poked over 200 holes in an external fuel tank.
After filling up, the NASA team will practice a launch. They will reset the clock to 10 minutes before takeoff. The tests will end with draining the fuel from the rocket.
When we roll, we will refer to that four-mile trip as the first four miles of NASA's return to the moon.
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