Artemis

NASA’s huge Space Launch System moon rocket finally took off from Florida early Wednesday after a decade in development, sending an unpiloted Orion crew capsule toward lunar orbit on a 25-day test flight to lay a path for astronauts to return to the moon for the first time since 1972.

NASA’s oft-delayed Artemis 1 lunar test flight finally got off the ground at 1:47 a.m. EST (0647 GMT) Wednesday with the inaugural blastoff of NASA’s huge Space Launch System moon rocket from Kennedy Space Center. The unpiloted demonstration mission will pave the way for future human missions to the moon.

NASA managers cleared the agency’s leak-bedeviled Artemis moon rocket for the start of another countdown early Monday, but engineers must resolve questions about hurricane-damaged insulation before the huge booster can be cleared for blastoff on an unpiloted moonshot.

NASA’s $4.1 billion Artemis moon rocket, exposed to the elements atop its Kennedy Space Center launch pad, was rocked by high winds and driving rain early Thursday as Hurricane Nicole roared ashore just south of the spaceport.

Hurricane Nicole made landfall on Florida’s east coast south of Kennedy Space Center early Thursday, while NASA’s Artemis 1 moon rocket rode out the storm on pad 39B. We’re streaming live views from Kennedy Space Center.

NASA said Tuesday the launch of its Artemis 1 moon rocket will be delayed from Nov. 14 to no earlier than Nov. 16 as approaching Tropical Storm Nicole interrupts preflight processing at Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

After replacing and recharging batteries in the Vehicle Assembly Building, NASA ground teams plan to roll the more than 30-story-tall Space Launch System rocket back to its launch pad early Friday at Kennedy Space Center for another try Nov. 14 to send the Artemis 1 test flight around the moon.