"If we didn't design it to be out there in harsh weather we picked the wrong launch spot":
NASA said on Friday that its Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft appear to have survived their encounter with Hurricane Nicole this week without incurring any significant damage.
"Right now there's nothing preventing us from getting to the 16th," said Jim Free, the engineer who leads the development of exploration systems for NASA. To that end, the space agency is working toward a launch at 1:04 am ET (06:04 UTC) on Wednesday, from Kennedy Space Center. This Artemis I mission will send an uncrewed Orion spacecraft around the Moon in preparation for human missions later this decade.
Free said Nicole produced significant winds over the spaceport in Florida. However, he did not provide precise numbers, nor exact design specifications that the Space Launch System rocket is designed to withstand. However, Free said that at no point was the rocket exposed to wind gusts above its design limits. This appears to check out, based on publicly available data. For example, the National Weather Service reported a maximum wind gust of 93 mph at an altitude of 200 feet at the rocket's launch pad, which is close to, but not above, the rocket's limit of 97 mph at that height (see full SLS design specifications for weather).
A preliminary inspection of the rocket on Thursday night and Friday night after the storm had passed revealed only some very minor issues, most of which had already been addressed by Friday afternoon when Free spoke to reporters during a teleconference. "We design it to be out there," Free said of the rocket, noting Kennedy Space Center's exposure to hurricanes on Florida's Atlantic coast. "If we didn't design it to be out there in harsh weather, we picked the wrong launch spot."
Even so, NASA did not leave its rocket exposed to Nicole's fury on Thursday by choice. The rocket's engineering teams engaged in long meetings last Sunday, as it was becoming clear that Nicole posed a serious threat. If they had made the decision to roll the Artemis I stack back inside the protective Vehicle Assembly Building at that time, the operation would not have been complete until Wednesday.
[]...] The early weather forecast for a launch attempt on the morning of November 16 in Florida is positive. Winds are forecast to be light, with partly to mostly clear skies. If there are technical issues that preclude the launch—this will be the third attempt to launch Artemis I in the last three months—NASA has another opportunity on Saturday, November 19. The agency has a final chance to launch this month on November 25, the day after the Thanksgiving holiday in the US.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by mhajicek on Monday November 14 2022, @06:13AM (2 children)
I'll believe it when I see it.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 2) by drussell on Monday November 14 2022, @03:16PM (1 child)
My thoughts, exactly...
After more than a decade of development, supposedly a first launch date of 2016, numerous pre-launch failures with this first flight delayed over and over it's magically going to work this time, everything will go perfectly and they'll go right on to a crewed mission on the second launch, all bug free? Ok. Sure.
I mean, don't get me wrong, I hope it actually works, but I'm certainly not going to be holding my breath!! :)
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Wednesday November 16 2022, @07:11AM
I saw it.
It flew.
It did not splode.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 3, Funny) by Frosty Piss on Monday November 14 2022, @11:47AM
Can't they wait for 04 July?
(Score: 1) by billbellum on Monday November 14 2022, @10:43PM (3 children)
Did no one think that the current poll might be in poor taste?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 15 2022, @01:41AM (1 child)
Why is it in poor taste?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday November 15 2022, @03:49AM
(Score: 2) by hubie on Tuesday November 15 2022, @05:45AM
It certainly wasn't intended to be in poor taste. When we lost all those days out of the database, the poll that was showing was very old and I thought it would look better if a new one took its place. Plus, with the magnitude of the site software rewrite/upgrade, I didn't think it a bad idea to put a new poll up to make sure that part of the code worked properly (and at least for me on my browser, it didn't format properly at first, but it appears to have been fixed now). The explicit dates in the poll were pulled from this article. If it is the "Never" option that rubbed you wrong, that isn't an unusual opinion expressed, whether cynically or through snark, so I thought I would add a category for it since I felt it would get more than a couple of votes, and it completes all of the possible outcomes (assuming that if it goes all the way through 2023 without launching, that the program would be in great danger of being canceled).
I personally think it will go off on its first opportunity since the weather is looking favorable, and though ULA might not be inexpensive, they do have a decent record of things working once the rocket is lit. If it does go up that soon, we'll have to put up a new poll sooner than later I suppose.