SLS Booster Arrives at Kennedy Space Center

Kennedy Space Center, FL. – This past week, on the morning of July 24, 2024, NASA was once again one more step forward in the Artemis II program and more step closer to a trip around the moon. At 9:00 AM EDT, the SLS booster core was off-loaded from the transport ship Pegasus and rolled into the Vehicle Assembly Building (V.A.B.)

Using repurposed parts from the Space Shuttle program, two of the four engines have a combined 20 flights on a Space Shuttle, one had been built and never flown and the fourth of was built on site at Kennedy Space Center.

Once inside the V.A.B., the booster will undergo testing and integration for flight. Along with the SLS booster, the processing of the twin side solid rocket motors is underway at the Rotation, Processing and Surge Facility (RPSF) at Kennedy Space Center.

In November of 2022, as part of the Artemis Program, NASA’s massive rocket the SLS launched from Launch Complex 39-B for the very first test mission of the rocket that is designed to take the Orion capsule to the Moon and eventually place astronauts back on the lunar surface.

NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman – Commander, Victor Glover – Pilot, Christina Koch – Mission Specialist and from Canada, Jeremy Hansen Mission Specialist will make the first humans to orbit the Moon since the end of the Apollo program with Apollo 17 in 1972.

Currently, the Artemis Mission is not scheduled till late 2025. Images Credit: Michael Howard and Graham Smith – We Report Space