Hurricane Ian blows NASA Artemis Moon launch into October or November

NASA's Moon-ward Space Launch System (SLS) rocket will not be blasting off from Earth until late October at the earliest, after the vehicle was rolled back to its hangar to shelter from an incoming hurricane. Tropical storm Ian is projected to hit Florida, where the SLS lives, over the next few days. Officials began …

[Anonymous Coward]

Probably closer to Nevember than November

But they get a blue ribbon for participation and a few million to update systems not designed for in place maintenance after months parked in the standby lot.

I'm sure there are plenty of Boeing execs hoping this hurricane season causes as many delays in Texas as it does in Florida. That or maybe they will roll it into the parking lot and fire off the remote launch abort next July 4th and give the whole project a viking funeral. They will still have one to display next to the Saturn V stack to use as a yardstick for the decline of western civilization.

They don't build 'em like they used to, even when the design is mostly recycled parts.

[lglethal]

Re: Probably closer to Nevember than November

You Sir are a Muppet.

You dont mess around with a giant explosive stack!

The delays until this point, have been because they've noticed anomalies during the preparation procedure and decided to correct them before attempting launch. That is the correct way to go about things when your dealing with a device that can leave a giant smoking crater in the Earth and ruin a large number of peoples day if it goes wrong.

It's now delayed by a giant hurricane that has already wiped out power to the entirety of Cuba. What would you prefer to do, launch it into strong high altitude winds that it's not designed for and hope for the best? Or you know wait a week or two and try again when the weather is optimal?

As for "They dont build them like they used to" the first Saturn V launch was delayed 10 months due to a myriad of issues. It was first due to fly in January 1967, but didnt end up flying until November. We're looking at about 1 months delay so already we've got 1000% improvement over Saturn V amazing, right?

[Spazturtle]

Re: Probably closer to Nevember than November

"What would you prefer to do, launch it into strong high altitude winds that it's not designed for and hope for the best?"

That is actually what happened with Challenger, they would likely have been able to get to orbit even after the O-Ring failed, but they had launched with wind speeds above the maximum allowed and the wind started to cause the SRBs to bend.

This combined with the failed O-ring is what created a large enough gap to cause the SBR to fail, Challenger cause have survived one of those issues, but not both together.

[Ian Johnston]

Re: Probably closer to Nevember than November

What would you prefer to do, launch it into strong high altitude winds that it's not designed for and hope for the best?

By the time a rocket has reached 80,000 feet it is doing, typically, 5,000 mph. How strong do you think high altitude winds are?

[Marty McFly]

Re: Probably closer to Nevember than November

April 1961 Yuri Gagarin beat us to space and encouraged America to get with the program. Saturn V first flew six and a half years later in November 1967. The Saturn V was just an idea at the time and everything had to be invented along the way.

Artemis started in 2017 out of a parts bin of proven components, building on around 60 years of knowledge and experience. Closing out five years later it still hasn't flown.

Yes, it seems we are under motivated or overly cautious by comparison to the rocket men of the 1960's.

That said... The Space Shuttle was nine years (1972-1981) from start to first flight, so Artemis maybe isn't doing that bad after all.

[lglethal]

Re: Probably closer to Nevember than November

You have to remember that after Yuri got into Space, NASA were given a blank cheque to get Americans to the moon first.

The Apollo Program spent $28 billion between 1960 and 1973. That's the equivalent of $280 billion in today's money. And they weren't building off zero previous knowledge, they were building off the V2 tech that came with Werner Von Braun after WW2.

The Artemis Program has a budget of $93 billion to get it through to 2025, and all the launches between now and then. So 1/3 of the budget that the Apollo program had.

Or to put it another way, NASA's entire budget for this year is $24 billion. The equivalent of a single Nimitz class Aircraft carrier. Look at it that way, and you'll quickly see that NASA is doing amazing things on a shoestring. Maybe when the Chinese start scoring some major space wins, NASA will get it's budget back, but I wouldnt bet on it happening before then...

(source for the budget figures: https://www.space.com/nasa-artemis-moon-program-93-billion-2025)

[Terje]

Re: Probably closer to Nevember than November

You gracefully forget that the Apollo program was totally new designs and breaking new grounds, the Artemis program was supposed to be based on supposedly proven "off the shelf" parts slightly modified and were supposed to be cheap, fast and easy... Anyone with an ounce of sanity left and not working at one of the plants on life support by the project should be able to see that it has been neither cheap fast or easy...

[Dronius]

Epic story soon to be the stuff of legends. Dear deer.

Atremis, goddess of vegetation..... gets blown into the weeds.

Didn't she stop the winds and strand a fleet of ships? maybe this time she'll be defeated by a Hera-cane.

[Snapper]

Re: Epic story soon to be the stuff of legends. Dear deer.

Artemis = twin sister of Apollo

[ThatOne]

Re: Epic story soon to be the stuff of legends. Dear deer.

> Atremis, goddess of vegetation..... gets blown into the weeds.

AFAIK Artemis is actually the goddess of hunt, nature, childbirth, care of children, and chastity (your guess how the last one fits in with childbirth).

[ArrZarr]

Re: Epic story soon to be the stuff of legends. Dear deer.

Demeter is the goddess of plants. We only have winter because she sulks for a third of the year when Persephone is off with her Husband.

Artemis is the good version of Apollo, except where rockets named after the twins are concerned.

[ThatOne]

Re: Epic story soon to be the stuff of legends. Dear deer.

> Artemis is the good version of Apollo

For some value of "good", given she's mostly the goddess of wilderness and wild beasts, and IIRC doesn't hesitate to kill anybody who angers her...

[ArrZarr]

Re: Epic story soon to be the stuff of legends. Dear deer.

I'm reasonably certain that her history contains vastly fewer deaths than Apollo.

How many of Apollo's lovers threw themselves of cliffs or turned into plants again?

Anyway, she got screwed on the deific domains compared to her brother.

[Potemkine!]

Atremis, goddess of vegetation.

That would be rather Demeter. Or maybe Pan.

== Bring us Dabbsy back! ==

[Steve K]

Demeter?

NASA have had problems with Demeter in the past…..

[Big_Boomer]

Delayed?

"Fun fact: The mission is named after the Latin word for 'delayed'". Somebody needs to check their sources. Delayed is "moratus" in Latin. If that comment was intended to be tongue-in-cheek then maybe mark it that way.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Delayed?

Artemis is not even a Latin name - it's Greek. In Latin pantheon she was Diana.

[Roj Blake]

Re: Delayed?

So you're saying the rocket will crash into a Parisian tunnel?

[ThatOne]

Re: Delayed?

> Somebody needs to check their sources. Delayed is "moratus" in Latin.

Came here to say the same thing! Which mission is named after what? Either it's an embarrassing error, or it went miles over my head (which would count as kind of embarrassing too).

[ArrZarr]

Re: Delayed?

I do believe that the subheading is what we in the biz call "A Joke".

Maybe not the best joke in the world but an attempt was made.

[ThatOne]

Re: Delayed?

I do think so too, but I'm still wondering what that joke was. (Paris icon ->)

[Anonymous Coward]

Meanwhile the RocketLab tortoise plods on - 4 months should see it arrive about 28 October.