NASA's moon megarocket launch was just delayed

NASA's former Space Shuttle manager saw this delay coming.

The space agency scrubbed the much anticipated first launch of its colossal new megarocket, the Space Launch System (SLS), on Monday morning, Aug. 29, due to a fueling problem with one of the rocket's engines. Wayne Hale, who ran flights for the retired Shuttle, recently gave 50-50 odds for the launch happening on its initial try. The next launch opportunity for the Artemis l mission, however, is quite soon, on Sept. 2.

"It’s the first launch of a new complex rocket and there are likely still bugs to be worked out. Sorry if that makes folks upset but best to be realistic," Hale recently tweeted.

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The official problem is that NASA couldn't get one of the rocket's four engines on its core stage (the big orange "backbone" of the rocket that's filled with liquid oxygen and hydrogen) within an acceptable temperature to safely launch the rocket. NASA engineers tried to fix the issue on the launchpad, but were unsuccessful. Importantly, "The Artemis I rocket and spacecraft are in a stable, safe condition," the space agency noted after the canceled launch.

"You don't want to light the candle until it's ready to go," NASA administrator Bill Nelson said on NASA TV after the agency scrubbed the launch.

"This is just a part of the space business," he added. 

NASA ran into buggy pre-launch testing issues this spring, too. But while it might be easy to criticize another delay, it's common for kinks to be worked out during test launches. And, critically, NASA has the responsibility of demonstrating an extremely safe rocket: If this launch is successful, the space agency will put astronauts on its next launch to the moon (a mission called Artemis ll). By late 2025, NASA plans for astronauts to once again walk on the chalky lunar surface, this time in the moon's shadowy south pole (Artemis ll).

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This mission, Artemis l, seeks to prove that both the new Space Launch System and the Orion spacecraft atop the rocket perform as planned and hold up to extreme space environs. Ultimately, NASA plans to use this colossal rocket to establish a permanent U.S. presence on and around the moon. After a 50-year lunar absence, SLS — though hugely expensive, delayed, and tangled in U.S. politics — will enable NASA to restart its human exploration of deep space.

This story is developing and will be updated.