About two weeks before the next planned launch attempt of NASA’s crisis-ridden moon mission “Artemis 1”, the US space agency wants to roll the rocket back to the launch site this week.
The so-called “rollout” at the Cape Canaveral spaceport in the US state of Florida should be completed on Friday, NASA announced at a press conference.
The launch attempt is then planned for around midnight (local time) on November 14. The next alternative dates would be November 16th, 19th and 25th. It is a test flight of the unmanned spacecraft to the moon.
So far, the mission has not been under a good star: Initially, two launch attempts had been canceled due to technical problems – including a leaking tank hose. Most recently, a launch planned for the end of September had to be canceled due to a tropical storm.
With the Artemis program, named after the Greek goddess of the moon, US astronauts will later land on the moon again, for the first time a woman and a non-white person.