{"id":450392,"date":"2026-02-03T03:39:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-03T03:39:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/450392\/"},"modified":"2026-02-03T03:39:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-03T03:39:07","slug":"nasas-artemis-rocket-suffers-fuel-leak-during-practice-countdown","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/450392\/","title":{"rendered":"NASA\u2019s Artemis rocket suffers fuel leak during practice countdown"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

NASA\u2019s SLS and Orion spacecraft at NASA\u2019s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Sunday.Sam Lott\/The Associated Press<\/p>\n

NASA ran into exasperating fuel leaks during a make-or-break test of its new moon rocket Monday, calling into question how soon astronauts could take off for a trip around the moon.<\/p>\n

The leaks \u2013 reminiscent of the rocket\u2019s delayed debut three years ago \u2013 sprang just a couple hours into the daylong fuelling operation at Kennedy Space Center.<\/p>\n

Launch controllers began loading the 98-metre rocket with super-cold hydrogen and oxygen at midday. More than 2.6 million litres had to flow into the tanks and remain on board for several hours, mimicking the final stages of an actual countdown.<\/p>\n

But excessive hydrogen quickly built up near the bottom of the rocket. Hydrogen loading was halted at least twice as the launch team scrambled to work around the problem using techniques developed during the previous Space Launch System countdown in 2022. That first test flight was plagued by hydrogen leaks before finally soaring without a crew.<\/p>\n

Cold snap narrows launch window for Artemis II mission<\/a><\/p>\n

The four astronauts assigned to the mission \u2013 three Americans and one Canadian \u2013 monitored the critical dress rehearsal from nearly 1,600 kilometres away in Houston, home to Johnson Space Center. They have been in quarantine for the past 1 1\/2 weeks, awaiting the practice countdown\u2019s outcome.<\/p>\n

Monday\u2019s fuelling demo will determine when they can blast off on the first lunar voyage by a crew in more than half a century.<\/p>\n

At best, NASA could launch commander Reid Wiseman and his crew to the moon no sooner than Sunday. The rocket must be flying by Feb. 11 or the mission will be called off until March. The space agency only has a few days in any given month to launch the rocket, and the extreme cold already has shortened February\u2019s launch window by two days.<\/p>\n

NASA readies for historic Artemis II flight around the moon<\/a><\/p>\n

Running behind because of the bitter cold snap, the countdown clocks began ticking Saturday night, giving launch controllers the chance to go through all the motions and deal with any lingering rocket problems. The clocks were set to stop a half-minute before reaching zero, just before engine ignition.<\/p>\n

The nearly 10-day mission will send the astronauts past the moon, around the mysterious far side and then straight back to Earth, with the goal of testing the capsule\u2019s life support and other vital systems. The crew will not go into lunar orbit or attempt to land.<\/p>\n

NASA last sent astronauts to the moon during the 1960s and 1970s Apollo program. The new Artemis program aims for a more sustained lunar presence, with Wiseman\u2019s crew setting the stage for future moon landings by other astronauts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: NASA\u2019s SLS and Orion spacecraft at NASA\u2019s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":450393,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[901,888,902,879,877,903,49,48,876,895,896,891,878,875,46,549,295,894,887,914,880,881,893,889,890,884,904,885,909,910,912,907,911,905,908,882,898,899,714,897,906,66,306,865,61,900,892,886,883,913],"class_list":["post-450392","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-alberta","tag-arts-news","tag-bc","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-british-columbia","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canada-news","tag-canada-sports","tag-canada-sports-news","tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","tag-canadian-breaking-news","tag-canadian-news","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-environment","tag-federal-government","tag-foreign-news","tag-globe-and-mail","tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","tag-government","tag-life-news","tag-lifestyle","tag-local-news","tag-manitoba","tag-national-news","tag-new-brunswick","tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","tag-northwest-territories","tag-nova-scotia","tag-nunavut","tag-ontario","tag-pei","tag-photos","tag-political-news","tag-political-opinion","tag-politics","tag-politics-news","tag-quebec","tag-science","tag-space","tag-sports-news","tag-technology","tag-travel","tag-trudeau","tag-us-news","tag-world-news","tag-yukon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=450392"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450392\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/450393"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=450392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=450392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=450392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}