NASA is now looking at launch windows in late September and early October.NASA managers Monday reviewed the threat posed by hurricane-damaged insulation on the Artemis moon rocket and cleared the $4.1 billion booster for launch "as is" early Wednesday. "If you watch it on TV it would probably be closer," he told VOA. And so, once you have made that determination and we decide that it is safe enough to fly with crew, we will have considered it a mission success."īut Mark Franko, who had to return to Tempe, Arizona, before the next potential launch, wonders if the effort to see Artemis 1 in person was worth it. "As you tick off the different boxes, you buy down a certain amount of risk for the crewed flight. "Mission success comes as we assess the flight after the fact," said David Reynolds, a deputy program manager for NASA, who added that the future of spaceflight depends on the performance of this first uncrewed attempt to return to the moon. But it's worth it."Īs NASA troubleshoots difficulties while carefully weighing the risks in launching Artemis, cost isn't the only factor. It takes time to build these complicated machines. We heard that with Crew Dragon flying – it was six years from the time the contract was awarded to the time we flew. Every aircraft I've been involved with, every spacecraft I've been involved with. He now works for Northrop Grumman, one of the contractors working on Artemis, and he is quick to respond to critics who say the current effort to return to the moon is behind schedule and over budget. "We've got to make sure the vehicle is ready to go, we've got to make sure it's safe for crew, and those things just take time," said Doug Hurley, a retired NASA astronaut who flew on the first crewed mission of Space X's Crew Dragon capsule to the International Space Station. Don't get your expectations too high."įILE - NASA astronaut Doug Hurley speaks at a news conference after he arrives at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., May 20, 2020. "There are many, many things that can go wrong. "It's the first time we've flown this rocket and this capsule," noted astronaut Stan Love, who spoke with VOA ahead of the first unsuccessful launch attempt. I don't think you can be too cautious," she said. I feel like it was too soon to go off after the first problem, and I think that, whether it was PR or whatever, they were trying to push the envelope but at the same time they can't. "I think that they should bring it back to the building and really check it out completely and then go again. But fuel leaks and other issues have twice postponed the most powerful rocket system ever created from taking off.ĭespite the delays, Franko's friend, Mary Jane Patterson, thinks NASA shouldn't be in a hurry to make the next launch attempt. "I was hoping to feel the noise and the power and the sound – it would have been pretty interesting to see, I think," Franko told VOA as he and his friends tried to watch a launch behind a local restaurant not far from Cape Canaveral. Hoping to witness the launch of NASA's Artemis 1 rocket to the moon is – so far – an exercise in frustration for Mark Franko.
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