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NASA's big rocket faces its last test before launching:
After two weeks of preparatory work on the launch pad at Kennedy Space Center, NASA is ready to put its large new rocket and its complex plumbing system to the test. This will be the final major rehearsal before the space agency declares that, after 11 long years and tens of billions of dollars in development costs, the Space Launch System is finally ready to fly.
The "wet dress rehearsal" is slated to begin at 5 pm ET (21:00 UTC) on Friday, when the launch control teams will arrive on console at the Launch Control Center. At that point, engineers and technicians will begin to power up the Orion spacecraft and the rocket itself. But the real action will not take place until Sunday.
At around 6 am ET, a team from NASA and the launch vehicle's contractors will enter a "launch day" countdown; shortly thereafter, they will start to fuel the rocket's core stage with liquid oxygen. The loading of liquid hydrogen will begin about an hour later. NASA has posted a tentative schedule with key milestones on its website.
After a series of holds, NASA plans to resume its countdown toward launch at 2:30 pm ET on Sunday and continue until about T-10 seconds, with the test ending before igniting the rocket's four main engines, which once powered NASA's space shuttle. If all goes well, the test will wrap up by around 5 pm on Sunday.
[...] So will all go well? During a call with reporters on Tuesday, senior NASA officials seemed fairly confident that the wet dress test would go off smoothly. However, they acknowledged that this is the first time the entire rocket and spacecraft will be handled and fueled in concert with its ground systems and the extensive software to manage it all. So yes, they acknowledged, things could go wrong.
About a week after the test is complete, NASA officials said they expect to be able to set a launch date for the Artemis 1 mission, which will fly an uncrewed Orion spacecraft around the Moon. Presently, this test flight will happen no earlier than June.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 04 2022, @06:44PM
SLS is a food stamp program for Boeing and Lockheed Martin executives and their pets in Congress. Claiming 'jobs' is just an excuse to make it palatable to the public. Those people could just as easily be gainfully employed doing useful work.
SpaceX has been viable since 2010, when the Falcon 9 went into service. SLS started development in 2011.
SLS does nothing about NASA's reliance on Roscosomos. Dragon and Cygnus spacecraft do that.
That's money that could all stay in America while actually doing something useful. The engineers building it could also be better employed doing actually useful work.
Never underestimate Congress' love of pork. SLS always gets more money than NASA asks for, but there is never enough for moon suits. Full funding for a lander only started this year.