Days after the world’s most powerful rocket rolled off the launch pad, the Space Launch System is ready for its maiden voyage. The Artemi-1 mission will launch to the Moon on Monday, as people around the world witnessed the historic event.
SLS with the Orion spacecraft on top will lift off on a 42-day journey into space and return to test the systems and process that will bring humans back to lunar orbit and the surface in the future. Artemis-1 will launch from the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida.
With Space Launch Delta 45, meteorologists have predicted a 70 percent chance of favorable weather for Monday’s launch. However, NASA has said that the primary weather concern for the two-hour launch window remains sporadic rain.
Immersive | 3,2,1…lift to the Moon with the world’s most powerful rocket
When to watch the launch of Artemis-1?
The spacecraft’s first launch is being targeted in a two-hour launch window on August 29. Lift-off is currently scheduled for Monday at 8:33 am EDT or 6:00 pm IST. The mission, which is a test flight, aims to establish the rocket’s capability to deliver.
Where to see Artemi-! Launch to the Moon?
You can track all the developments related to the first launch of the Space Launch System on the Moon indiatoday.in As we bring you all the details of the mission. A live feed of the mission is below from NASA along with footage of when it happens.
The 322-foot (98-meter) rocket will attempt to send an empty crew capsule into distant lunar orbit 50 years after NASA’s famous Apollo moonshots.
NASA’s high-tech, automated Orion capsule is named after the constellation, the brightest one in the night sky. At 11 feet (3 m) tall, it is more spacious than Apollo’s capsule, which seats four astronauts instead of three.
For this test flight, a full-size dummy in an orange-colored flight suit, along with vibration and acceleration sensors, will occupy the commander’s seat. Two other effigies made of a material simulating human tissue – the head and femur torsos, but no organs – will measure cosmic radiation, one of the biggest risks to spacecraft.
If all goes well, astronauts could strap on for a lap around the Moon by 2024, with NASA aiming to land two people on the lunar surface by the end of 2025.
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