CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla.-- NASA’s giant new moon rocket headed to the launch pad Saturday in preparation for astronauts’ first lunar fly-around in more than half a century.The out-and-back trip could blast off as early as February.The 322-foot (98-meter) rocket began its 1 mph (1.6 kph) creep from Kennedy Space Center’s Vehicle Assembly Building at daybreak.The four-mile (six-kilometer) trek could take until nightfall.Weighing in at 11 million pounds (5 million kilograms), the Space Launch System rocket and Orion crew capsule on top made the move aboard a massive transporter that was used during the Apollo and shuttle eras.
It was upgraded for the SLS rocket’s extra heft.The first and only other SLS launch — which sent an empty Orion capsule into orbit around the moon — took place back in November 2022.“This one feels a lot different, putting crew on the rocket and taking the crew around the moon,” NASA’s John Honeycutt said on the eve of the rocket’s rollout.Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover and Christina Koch — longtime NASA astronauts with spaceflight experience — will be joined on the 10-day mission by Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen, a former fighter pilot awaiting his first rocket ride.They will be the first people to fly to the moon since Apollo 17’s Gene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt closed out the triumphant lunar-landing program in 1972.Twelve astronauts strolled the lunar surface, beginning with Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin in 1969.Only four moonwalkers are still alive; Aldrin, the oldest, turns 96 on Tuesday.Popular ReadsMinneapolis ICE shooting live updates: Protests get tense near City Hall1 hour agoMajority of Americans say ICE agent’s shooting of Good was unjustified, inappropriateJan 15, 5:21 PMState Department warns US citizens to leave VenezuelaJan 11, 10:28 PM“They are so fired up that we are headed back to the moon,” Wiseman said.
“They just want to see humans as far away from Earth as possible discovering the unknown.”NASA is waiting to conduct a fueling test of the SLS rocket on the pad in early February before confirming a launch date.The space agency has only five days to launch in the first half of February before bumping into March.___The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.The AP is solely responsible for all content.
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