Artemis Stuff

[Yazata]

Scrub again.

This time, due to a hydrogen leak being detected. They are currently detanking.

The next launch opportunity will be Monday.

Whether that is possible will depend on where the leak is determined to be, and on what it takes to fix it. Rolling the whole thing back to the VAB will set them back weeks.

[C C]

I didn't bother to be on time for this one, either. Figured they're going to repeatedly struggle trying to get the bugs out of the active launch phase, as they did engineering a new "rocket sitting on the shelf".

[Yazata]

They are planning a live-streamed media briefing at 4 PM EDT.

Officially, there's no determination about what they are going to do. But there are rumors that it will go back to the VAB for complete checkout. If that's what they are going to do, they won't be launching until mid to late October. (There's an early October window, but they have a manned Crew Dragon to the ISS planned for then, and want to devote all of their attention to it.)

[confused2]

There's a stark contrast between the Spacex approach of 'you build (and fly) rockets until you're really, really good at it.' and NASA .. 'You hand build one or two rockets really, really carefully.'. I wouldn't suggest for a moment that NASA aren't best on planet Earth but I think Elon might have the best approach.

[RainbowUnicorn]

if it blows up its going to cost more time & money than delaying the launch

news says cant fix fuel leak
launch is delayed until the end of the month

so it sounds like they are going to roll it back in to the shed

if it was cheap & small they could afford to blow a few of them up
more climate change friendly to have it not blow up

[Yazata]

Cape Canaveral Drama

They did a successful cryo tanking test out there on the pad and the hydrogen leak was down to acceptable limits. (Hydrogen is always going to leak, so the goal is to keep the rates as low as possible.) The Range Safety people from the Space Force approved an extension on the batteries for the flight termination system.

So they were all happy and the launch was (and technically still is) on for September 27.

Except that a tropical depression is strengthening into a hurricane near the Caymans, expected to pass over Havana, and continue strengthening as it passes over warm Gulf waters until landfall as a projected category 3 around Sarasota. Then it will travel up the Florida peninsula towards Orlando. That will have significant impacts at Cape Canaveral. Even if the hurricane hasn't reached that area by launch time, it will push significant cloud cover in front of it. But... the National Hurricane Center has the hurricane still located near Havana Tuesday morning. Very iffy...

https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/graphics_at4.sh...t#contents

Chances of a weather scrub are now estimated to be 80%. They are currently deciding whether to roll the SLS back to the protection of the Vertical Assembly Building.

Latest news from briefing happening as I write this: SLS is still on the pad and they are working towards a launch on Sept 27. But they are simultaneously working towards a rollback to safety if that becomes necessary. Both are established procedures and both are happening at the same time. Decision which way to go with hasn't been made yet. (My guess is they will roll it back...)

[Image: FdWWvwVX0AENBAJ?format=png&name=900x900]

[Yazata]

NASA has scrapped the idea of launching Sept 27, but is still undecided about rolling SLS back to the VAB. They will make that decision tomorrow (Sunday) with rollback to start Sunday night into Monday. Even if they don't roll back, but don't launch Tuesday, they will seemingly need another extension on the FTS batteries.

https://blogs.nasa.gov/artemis/2022/09/2...-rollback/

[Yazata]

#1 - SLS was moved back to the VAB last night.

#2 - Emre Kelly of Florida Today reports that the VAB has just been evacuated and emergency crews are on the scene. He's also reporting that the body language of the workers who were evacuated (some are sitting on lawn chairs) doesn't show much urgency. (My guess is that there was a toxic chemical spill inside or something like that.)

Edit - Emre Kelley reports that he was told that it was a "small electrical fire". Probably no big deal.

Photo by Florida Today's Emre Kelly - workers at lower left

[Image: FdrOhZEWYAAts3Q?format=jpg&name=large]

---

First NASA official statement.

At approximately 11:45 AM local, a fire was reported in the VAB. The building was evacuated and there are no injuries. They say that the VAB is "fire safe" and the Artemis I vehicle "was not at risk". More updates to come.

https://twitter.com/NASAKennedy/status/1...0942756866

[Yazata]

https://twitter.com/TheOnion/status/1574862708117225472

[Yazata]

NASA has announced a new launch date for Artemis 1. It will be 12:07 AM Monday November 14 eastern time. (9:07 PM Sunday November 13 pacific time.) As we've already seen, this is subject to change.

https://blogs.nasa.gov/artemis/2022/10/1...n-mission/