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The launch of NASA’s new mega-moon rocket was postponed indefinitely after problems with one of the four engines scuttled the effort to lift off for the six-week, uncrewed test mission to orbit the moon.

NASA was hoping for a Monday launch of the most powerful rocket it has ever built, aiming at for a rendezvous with the moon, in what the space agency is billing as a giant leap in returning humans to the lunar surface for the first time in a half-century.

But engineers were having to resolve a series of issues. First 

 on Saturday initially caused some concern, but officials later said there was no damage to the vehicle, the capsule, or ground equipment. Then came a 45-minutes weather delay early Monday morning that delayed the procedure for filling the core stage with its hydrogen fuel. A leak was also discovered, but resolved.

At 40 minutes before scheduled launch, the launch team put the countdown on hold while they tried to evaluate a problem with getting one of the core-stage engines to the correct temperature for launch. It wasn't immediately clear if the problem could be resolved in time to meet a two-hour launch window that opens at 8:33 a.m. ET.

 (SLS) rocket, topped by an uncrewed Orion spacecraft, was rolled out earlier this month to the same historic launch complex used by the mighty Saturn V during the Apollo moonshots that ended in 1972.

 — named after the twin sister of Apollo — is a trial run of hardware needed to go back to the moon for longer stays and more 

"It is an incredible step for all of humankind," NASA astronaut Nicole Mann told 

 "This time going to the moon to stay. And it's really the building blocks for our exploration to Mars."

The Artemis program, expected to have an 

, promises to refocus NASA's long-term human space-flight goals, paving the way for eventually establishing a crewed base near the moon's south pole and crewed missions to Mars.

But one key piece of the program — the vehicle that will actually land — will not be part of the first Artemis mission. Elon Musk's SpaceX has been contracted to build a 

 to take astronauts to the surface. The vehicle 

 Another component of the original Artemis program, 

, a sort of deep-space way station for astronauts to and from a future moon base, is also still under development.

The SLS sports stretched versions of the 

 used by the space shuttle, which last flew more than a decade ago, as well as four 

 after previously flying on shuttle missions. The rocket's upper stage will be powered by a type of engine first developed in the late 1950s.

Boeing is the prime contractor for the SLS core stage and upper stage. Boeing's chief engineer for the SLS program, Noelle Zietsman, says that in building the giant rocket, engineers drew from the "foundations and fundamentals" of the Saturn V and space shuttle years.

"We've got our missions that we're focused on right now to the moon," she says. "But [the SLS] is for deep space exploration. ... So, the capability is much greater and larger beyond just the moon landing."

 spacecraft, which will take up to four astronauts into lunar orbit on future missions, resembles the Apollo-era "command module." Finally, a 

, attached to Orion, is comparable in function to Apollo's service module and will provide propulsion, electricity, water, oxygen and climate control to future crews.

"When you look at the rocket, it almost looks retro," NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said earlier this month. "But it's a totally different, new, highly sophisticated, more sophisticated rocket and spacecraft."

The six-week Artemis I test flight will send Orion into what is known as a 

, an oblong circuit that will take it just 62 miles from the moon's surface at one point and well beyond the moon at another.

Artemis I's Orion will fly without some life support systems and crew support items or a docking system, which won't be needed on the first flight, says Mike Hawes, Orion program manager for Lockheed Martin, which is building the capsule.

Instead, three mannequins equipped with radiation and vibration sensors will sit in. "Getting the radiation profile and having a long exposure in this unique lunar orbit is really important to us as we get ready to fly crew," Hawes says.

NASA is planning to fly four astronauts aboard Artemis II in 2024, with Artemis III set for the program's first landing a year later. The space agency says the program will eventually put the first woman and first person of color on the moon. But delays and cost overruns have plagued Artemis, and its predecessor, 

 issued last year predicted that the space agency would "exceed its timetable" for the first Artemis moon landing "by several years."

After liftoff, Artemis I will enter low-Earth orbit, where Orion's service module will unfurl solar panels before boosting itself into a higher orbit in preparation for a four-day trip to lunar orbit.

On a future landing, NASA hopes to be able to mine water ice that has been 

 deep in polar craters that never see sunlight — a critical resource for drinking, breathable oxygen and to eventually produce rocket fuel. A lunar base could prove an invaluable stepping stone for crewed flights to Mars, where the moon's low gravity would make such missions easier to launch.

 as candidates for the Artemis III surface mission a few years from now. Those locations have been chosen for ease of landing, exposure to sunlight so that a spacecraft can generate solar power, and their nearness to possible permanently shadowed ice deposits.

"The lunar south pole is an absolutely extraordinary geologic terrain," says David Kring, a lunar geologist at the Center for Lunar Science & Exploration in Houston, Texas. "We are going to learn so much about the evolution of the moon."

"When we better understand the evolution of the moon, we are going to be better understanding the evolution of our own planet Earth," he adds.

A polar mission, however, will be something new. It represents a departure from Apollo, which placed a dozen astronauts at sites all nearer the moon's equator.

"The topography looks a bit more remarkable at the south, just because the sun angle is so low," says Bethany Ehlmann, associate director of the Keck Institute for Space Studies at the California Institute of Technology.

, a robotic mission set for next year that will produce detailed maps of those permanently shadowed crater regions that could contain ice.

At the south pole, "the terrain is comparable" to the Apollo landing sites nearer the equator, she says. "And frankly, landing systems are better now than in the 1970s."

Brendan Byrne of member station WMFE, contributed to this story.

Science

Scott Neuman

Author

Artemis I will not be launching today after all, after problems with one of the four engines scuttled the long-anticipated effort to lift off for the six-week, uncrewed test mission to orbit the moon.

NASA scrubs today's scheduled launch due to engine problems

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