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The giant moon rocket Artemis I is preparing for another test Wednesday before its next attempt to launch it around the moon and back.
The mission team aims to get started The cryogenic demonstration of Artemis I will be tested at 7:15 am ET on Wednesday and NASA will share the live coverage on its website. The Space Launch System rocket and the Orion spacecraft continue to sit on the launch pad at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
Since the second unmanned Artemis I mission launch attempt on Sept. 3, engineers have replaced two seals at the liquid hydrogen fuel line interface between the rocket and the mobile launcher, according to NASA officials. This seal was associated with a large loss of hydrogen which resulted in the friction of the launch effort.
Artemis mission leader Mike Sarafin said that when engineers replaced the seal on the 8-inch (20 cm) quick-break pipe for hydrogen, they found “witness marks,” or indentations, in the associated seals. to the debris of foreign bodies. NASA press conference on Monday.
Sarafin said the team found no pieces of debris, but the dents were visible and indicated a problem contributing to the loss of hydrogen.
The indentation is less than 0.01 inch (0.3mm), but This allows the compressed gas to escape, which can be very dangerous because hydrogen is flammable. The team believes the dent is related to the leak, but test results can confirm this.
Sarafin said the large hydrogen leak on September 3 was between two and three times the acceptable limit.
The purpose of the cooling demonstration was to test the seal and use an updated “softer” loading procedure for the ultra-cooled propellant, which the rocket will test on launch day.
Unlike Training in the wetArtemis I Test Previously, by simulating each phase before launch, cryogenic testing focused on a very specific aspect of the countdown: loading supercooled liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen into the rocket’s core and upper stages.
said Jeremy Parsons, deputy director of NASA’s Earth Exploration Systems program at Kennedy Space Center.
A more delicate and gentle loading procedure is to reduce the pressure build-up and heat build-up seen during previous launch attempts. To achieve this, the team will slowly increase the pressure on liquid hydrogen storage tanks. The slower procedure is estimated to add no more than 30 minutes to the process, Parsons said.
“It will be a very slow and steady climb,” Parsons said. “So (we) are just trying to slowly introduce some of these thermal differences and reduce thermal shock and stress.”
Liquid oxygen is relatively dense, about the density of water, and is pumped into a rocket. Meanwhile, hydrogen is so light that it is mixed using pressure rather than pumped, said Tom Whitmer, associate director of NASA’s Joint Exploration Systems Development.
Whitmer says the new loading will use a slower compression rate with gradual temperature changes.
Calls to the test station, when all mission-related teams arrive on their consoles and report that they are ready, begin today at 3:00 PM ET. The mission team expects to receive a “launch” to begin refueling the rocket around 7:00 am EDT on Wednesday. Hopefully, Parsons said, the team expects the test to finish by 3 p.m. ET that day.
The test will also include bleeding the engine, which cools the engine on startup. The mission team canceled the first attempt to launch Artemis I on August 29 due to an issue with the faulty sensor that occurred during this bleeding.
So far, the outlook looks promising for the test. The Artemis team received daily information about Hurricane Fiona if it had to do with returning the missile assembly to the vehicle assembly building, a process that could take three days.
If the cryogenic test goes well, the next launch could be attempted on Tuesday, Sept. 27, with a 70-minute window opening at 11:37 am ET. Mission managers will meet to discuss test results on September 25 to consider a possible launch date.
If Artemis I had been launched that day, it would have served a 39-day mission and returned to Earth on 5 November. It is possible that there will be another release date for the backup on October 2nd. Although NASA recommends this launch date, the team ultimately relies on a decision by the US Space Force to issue a launch waiver.
The US Space Force, an arm of the army, still oversees all missile launches from the east coast of the United States, including the NASA launch site in Florida, and this area is known as the Eastern Range.
Cover officers are assigned to ensure that there is no danger to people or property in any launch attempt.
The Artemis team continued to have “productive and collaborative” discussions with the Eastern Range, and NASA shared additional detailed information that the Space Force requested for review.
Whitmer said the team is moving forward step by step and wants to pass the test before making another decision.
“We will leave when we are ready,” said Sarafin. “But in terms of the flight gain of this flight, we said from the start that this is the first in a series of increasingly complex and deliberate rocket pressure tests.”
The inaugural mission of the Artemis program will initiate NASA’s space exploration phase, which aims to land a motley crew of astronauts on previously unexplored lunar regions: Artemis II and Artemis III The missions scheduled for 2024 and 2025 respectively have finally sent a manned mission to Mars.
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