The first SLS launch is expected to slide until 2022

WASHINGTON – A senior NASA official said the agency will soon set a target launch date for the space launch system’s first mission, but it is “more than likely” to slip into early 2022 .

Speaking during a webinar on the Maryland Space Business Roundtable on September 30, NASA Associate Administrator Bob Cabana said a firm date for the launch of the Artemis 1 mission has not been set. , but suggested it was unlikely to take place before the end of this year.

“I’ll give you a firm date on this, hopefully after next week.” We will set an initial date once the team comes and let us know where we are at, ”he said. “We will be stealing this Artemis 1 mission, hopefully, more than likely, early next year.”

NASA officials were hopeful that Artemis 1 could still launch before the end of the year, even if they increasingly hedge their bets. “Artemis 1 will be at the end of this year or early next year,” NASA administrator Bill Nelson said on a call with reporters on Sept. 21.

Cabana said workers had just finished the night before SLS “modal tests”, where the vehicle is subjected to vibrations to determine its natural frequencies. The next step is the installation of the Orion spacecraft, taking the place of a mass simulator currently on top of the rocket. He said the Orion spacecraft will be moved to the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) at Kennedy Space Center on October 13 to be integrated into SLS.

Once in place, the entire stack will be deployed to Launch Complex 39B for a wet dress rehearsal, where the main stage is filled with liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen in a workout countdown that s ‘stops just before the firing of the four RS-25 engines on the scene. After that, the rocket will return to the VAB for any final work and revisions before returning to the pad for launch.

When asked later in the presentation to give his best guess as to when Artemis 1 will launch as well as future Artemis missions, he declined, citing the upcoming briefing. “Next week Jim Free and Kathy [Lueders] come and tell me and the rest of the team about all the work they were doing at Kennedy this week, ”he said. “Hopefully we will have realistic dates for where we’re going to carry out these missions as we go along. So hold on.”

NASA appointed Free its new Associate Administrator for Exploration Systems Development on September 21, as part of a restructuring that split the former Directorate of the Human Exploration and Operations Mission (HEOMD) into two organizations. Lueders, who was previously in charge of HEOMD, is now Associate Administrator for Space Operations, responsible for the International Space Station and related programs.

Cabana approved the reorganization as it offered a “more focused look” on exploration programs in particular. “He’s just a great engineer and an exceptional program manager,” he said of Free, who returned to the private sector agency to lead the new direction of exploration. “It will be his goal to provide the systems we need to run Artemis and a sustainable return to the moon, and then continue to move to Mars.”