NASA’S biggest ever rocket will take flight for the first time tomorrow on a month-long trip around the Moon.
Wherever you are in the world, you can catch the launch live online as Nasa fires an uncrewed spacecraft to the heavens.
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How to watch Artemis I live
Artemis I is expected to liftoff from the Kennedy Space Centre in Cape Canaveral, Florida, at 2:17 p.m. EST (7:17 p.m. UK time).
Tens of thousands of people are expected to make the journey to The Sunshine State to watch the launch in person.
For those of us who can’t get there, Nasa is broadcasting the launch live on its website and official YouTube channel.
The Virtual Telescope Project (VTP) will attempt to capture an image of Orion in the night sky above Italy less than two hours after launch.
You can catch that live stream on the VTP’s website.
What is Artemis I?
Artemis I is the first part of Nasa’s hotly-anticipated campaign to put humans back on the Moon.
Following years of delays, it was scheduled to finally launch from Nasa’s Kennedy Space Center in Flordia on Monday, August 29.
However, the launch date was pushed back to September 3 due to an error while fuelling the mission’s Space Launch System megarocket.
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When the flight does finally go ahead, the rocket will fire an uncrewed Orion capsule beyond Earth’s orbit.
The capsule, loaded with scientific instruments and a couple of mannequins, will then detach and begin a 42-day tour of space.
It will travel around the Moon and back to simulate the lunar flight that will eventually be undertaken by a team of astronauts.
The flight will allow for the testing of hardware ahead of Nasa’s plan to land the first woman and the first person of colour on the Moon by 2025.
That crewed mission is being referred to as Artemis III and a lot has to happen before it can take place.
Artemis I spacecraft explained
Artemis I isn’t a crewed mission. It will loop around the Moon to test three key components ahead of crewed missions later this decade.
These are Nasa’s Space Launch System (SLS), the Orion capsule, and the European Service Module (ESM).
The European Space Agency-built ESM is Orion’s power unit, giving it the juice it requires to reach Earth’s rocky satellite.
The Orion spacecraft and the ESM should get within 62 miles of the lunar surface and then travel 40,000 miles beyond this.
Once it has looped around the dark side of the Moon, the spacecraft will return to Earth, landing in the Pacific off the coast of San Diego.
Nasa completed a “wet dress rehearsal” of the SLS back in March and has changed the proposed launch date several times already.
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This post first appeared on Thesun.co.uk
