Nasa could CANCEL Monday launch of historic Artemis Moon mission as surprise storm rolls in

THE weather in Florida isn’t looking great next week which could wreck havoc on Nasa’s big $93billion Moon mission.

Final preparations are well underway for Monday’s blast off but forecasts suggest storms could roll in.

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The first flight of Nasa‘s next-generation Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and Orion spaceship are ready and waiting at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

If things don’t improve, the space agency could be forced to postpone.

Such technical projects require careful planning and there’s only a short two hour window from 8.33am ET on August 29 available to get everything right.

Should lift off be aborted, the next opportunity won’t be too far away.

Experts already have September 2 penciled in their diaries just in case.

And should the second attempt also fail, they’ve got September 5 to have another try as well.

Nasa won’t know for sure until they receive a detailed assessment from the 45th Weather Squadron, which is due very soon.

There are actually a lot of strict weather conditions required to get the mission off the ground.

The space agency has 17 specific “do not launch” criteria.

The rocket cannot be rolled out to the launch pad if a lightning forecast is greater than 10 percent within 20 nautical miles of the launch area during rollout, for example.

Artemis is a big deal for Nasa, as it races to land the first woman and the first person of colour on the Moon by 2025.

This maiden flight is an uncrewed test that needs to loop around the Moon to check that three key components work before humans can hop aboard.

Once looping around the dark side of the Moon, the rocket should land in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of San Diego.

Nasa completed a “wet dress rehearsal” of the SLS back in March.

Things have already been delayed as it is.

The space agency originally hoped for a May launch date but decided to push it back to conduct more tests.

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