The unmanned NASA flight to the Moon was once again halted just before its launch this past Saturday after yet another fuel leak was found on the massive 322-foot Artemis 1 rocket.
The fuel leak from this past Saturday is the second such event found with the rocket this week just before a scheduled launch. Artemis 1, which is the most powerful rocket that has been built by NASA, was first slated to launch on Monday, but a leak of its extremely explosive oxygen halted the rocket and pushed the timeframe for its takeoff to this past Saturday.
“We’ll go when it’s ready. We don’t go until then and especially now on a test flight, because we’re going to stress this and test it … and make sure it’s right before we put four humans up on the top of it,” explained Bill Nelson, an Administrator for NASA, in the wake of the cancelled launch on Saturday, stating, “This is part of our space program: Be ready for the scrubs.”
The #Artemis I mission to the Moon has been postponed. Teams attempted to fix an issue related to a leak in the hardware transferring fuel into the rocket, but were unsuccessful. Join NASA leaders later today for a news conference. Check for updates: https://t.co/6LVDrA1toy pic.twitter.com/LgXnjCy40u
— NASA (@NASA) September 3, 2022
The launch team had just started to fill up the Artemis 1 with almost one million gallons of the extremely explosive fuel early that morning when they spotted yet another fuel leak at the base of the rocket near the engine section, as reported by Associated Press. Nelson claimed that the impending repairs to the NASA rocket could push the launch window back to October if they are in-depth since Artemis 1 would most likely be taken down off of the launch pad and moved back to its hangar.
The area ground crews attempted to deal with the leak themselves instead of scuttling the launch, attempting to stop and resume the flow if liquid hydrogen and flushing helium through the fuel lines, but could not stop the leak, as reported by the AP.
This popular and anticipated launch earlier in the week came to a horribly disappointing end when the rockets’ bleed test issues caused the launch to cancel on Monday morning. The Artemis mission from NASA seeks to put the first woman and the first person of color on the surface of the moon eventually. The highly publicized space program also wants to “collaborate with commercial and international partners and establish the first long-term presence on the Moon.”
Nasa also seeks to put Artemis 1 into orbit around the Moon for a five-week demo with a group of test dummies as it sets back up to put actual astronauts back in space to fly around the Moon in 2024 and land on its surface in 2025.