NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman ruled out on Saturday that the Artemis 2 mission would launch in March due to technical problems with the rocket, designed to transport astronauts around the Moon for the first time in more than 50 years.
With this announcement, the launch, which is already years behind schedule, will be postponed until at least April 1.
The postponement comes the day after an optimistic announcement by NASA, which had set March 6 as the launch date following a seemingly successful major dress rehearsal.
However, engineers at the agency identified a helium leak in one of the rocket’s stages overnight, Isaacman explained in X.
“Whatever the malfunction,” it will force the U.S. space agency to return the rocket to the assembly building, which “rules out the launch window” scheduled for March, the new NASA administrator said.
“I understand that people are disappointed,” he continued, drawing a parallel with the setbacks suffered during the first Apollo lunar program.
“In the 1960s, when NASA achieved what most believed impossible, and what has never been replicated since, there were many setbacks,” he recalled.
Six windows in April
The Artemis 2 mission will be the first manned flight around the Moon since the end of the US program in 1972, which took the first and only humans to the lunar surface.
Three Americans and one Canadian will participate.
During this test flight, the crew will orbit Earth’s natural satellite without landing on the moon and will test the equipment in preparation for the next mission, Artemis 3, which will mark the return of Americans to the surface of the moon, with the aim of establishing a lasting presence.
Their mission will be groundbreaking in several ways, as it will be the first lunar flight to include a woman, a Black man, and a Canadian.
NASA now has six possible launch windows in April and could have others in the coming months if necessary.
Its director promised on Saturday that the agency will provide an update in the coming days.
During preparations in 2022 for the Artemis 1 mission, which consisted of an unmanned flight around the Moon, the US space agency had already faced technical problems that delayed the launch by several months.
The Artemis 2 mission will take place in the context of space competition between the United States and China, two rival powers that aspire to send humans to the Moon and establish a base there in the coming years.
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