NASA plans to launch the Artemis II moon mission as soon as April 1 after crews fix an issue that stopped helium from reaching the upper stage of the rocket.
The earliest the manned mission can launch from Florida’s Kennedy Space Center is at 6:24 p.m. on the first day of next month.
If the two-hour launch window on that date does not work out, NASA also has available 8 p.m. April 3, 8:53 p.m. April 4, 9:40 p.m. April 5 and 10:36 p.m. April 6.
If none of the launch windows in the first week of April work out for NASA, however, the launch of Artemis II will have to wait until at least 6:06 p.m. April 30, per the NASA availability calendar.
Artemis II was once slated to launch this coming Friday, but last month, NASA technicians found that the flow of helium to the upper stage of the Space Launch System rocket had stopped overnight, according to The Associated Press.
The helium is needed to preserve the proper environment within the rocket as well as for pressurization, NASA said.
While the work is ongoing to fix the helium problem, NASA is using the delay period to put in new batteries on the rocket and the Orion spacecraft. In addition, work began Monday to replace a seal for an oxygen line on the rocket, NASA said.
Once Artemis II launches, the rocket will take the Orion spacecraft, crewed by American astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen, on a 10-day flyby around the moon.
Artemis II is meant to test out the capabilities of both the Space Launch System rocket and the Orion spacecraft ahead of future missions intended to return Americans to the moon’s surface and eventually take NASA astronauts to Mars.
• Brad Matthews can be reached at bmatthews@washingtontimes.com.
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