With One Moon Rocket Issue Fixed, Another Appears

NASA's first crewed trip around the moon in more than 50 years is still a ways off. The agency will roll its towering Space Launch System rocket off the launchpad and back to the Vehicle Assembly Building at Kennedy Space Center on Wednesday to investigate a helium flow blockage in the upper stage, pushing the already delayed Artemis II mission out of its March launch window and into April at the earliest, NBC News reports. NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman acknowledged "disappointment" around the move. NASA officials had teased a March 6 liftoff as recently as Friday, per CNN.

The helium issue came as a surprise during Thursday's wet dress rehearsal, which confirmed earlier hydrogen fuel leaks had been fixed, per CNN. The 322-foot rocket and attached Orion capsule—about 11 million pounds in all—will now crawl the four miles back to the hangar at roughly 1mph, a trip expected to take up to 12 hours, according to NASA. Once inside, engineers will set up platforms to reach the problem area, inspect the helium issue, and swap out and test batteries in the upper stage and the rocket's flight termination system.

NASA says new launch opportunities open April 1 and run through April 6, with April 30 serving as another possible launch date, but the exact date will depend on what the team finds. Artemis II, to carry NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch, and Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen on a roughly 10-day loop around the moon, will be the first crewed flight of both the SLS rocket and Orion capsule.