The first of two Artemis I aft booster segments for the Space Launch System is lowered onto the mobile launcher in High Bay 3 of the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Nov. 23, 2020.
Workers with Exploration Ground Systems and contractor Jacobs teams will stack the twin five-segment boosters on the mobile launcher in High Bay 3 over a number of weeks. When the core stage arrives, it will join the boosters on the mobile launcher, followed by the interim cryogenic propulsion stage and Orion spacecraft. Manufactured by Northrop Grumman in Utah, the twin boosters provide more than 75 percent of the total SLS thrust at launch.
The SLS is managed by Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. Under the Artemis program, NASA will land the first woman and the next man on the Moon by 2024. The first in a series of increasingly complex missions, Artemis I will test the Orion spacecraft and SLS as an integrated system ahead of crewed flights to the Moon.
KSC-20201123-PH-CSH01_0001 Photo credit: NASA/Corey Huston Larger image
