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posted by Fnord666 on Monday November 30 2020, @12:55PM   Printer-friendly
from the stacking-exercise dept.

SLS: Nasa 'megarocket' assembly begins in Florida:

Nasa has started assembling the first Space Launch System (SLS) rocket on a launch platform ahead of its maiden flight next year.

The SLS is the giant rocket that will send US astronauts back to the Moon this decade - with the first crewed landing targeted for 2024.

Engineers in Florida have begun stacking the segments that make up the vehicle's two solid rocket boosters.

[...] Teams at Nasa's Kennedy Space Center in Florida lowered the first of 10 booster segments into place on a structure known as the mobile launcher on 21 November. The process is taking place inside the iconic Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) at Kennedy.

The boosters will burn six tonnes of solid, aluminium-based propellant each second when the SLS launches. They provide 75% of the vehicle's thrust at lift-off.

The mobile launcher they're being stacked on is a 115m (380ft) -tall structure that's used to process and assemble the SLS before moving it to the launch pad.

It's a huge symbolic step, not only for the SLS - which has been under development for a decade - but also Nasa's plan to send the next man and the first woman to the lunar surface by 2024, known as Artemis.


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  • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday November 30 2020, @04:12PM (2 children)

    by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Monday November 30 2020, @04:12PM (#1082407) Journal

    By delaying the Artemis program, this will give SLS the necessary time to continue development on their rocket under their cost plus contract. Can't rush things.

    Those last three words sound like they could have been said by someone at Blue Origin.

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  • (Score: 2) by takyon on Monday November 30 2020, @04:23PM

    by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Monday November 30 2020, @04:23PM (#1082414) Journal

    Gradatim Ferociter!

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  • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 30 2020, @04:59PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 30 2020, @04:59PM (#1082430)

    By delaying the Artemis program, this will give SLS the necessary time to continue development on their rocket under their cost plus contract. Can't rush things.

    That's not the issue *at all*. This is the issue [youtube.com]. It was the beginning of the great age of human exploration of space.