On Friday, NASA completed a critical repair of its next-generation Space Launch System (SLS) rocket. Engineers replaced the leaky seal of the Artemis 1 rocket.
On 3rd September, a fitting on one of the fuel lines to the SLS began leaking hydrogen. Kennedy Space Center’s Ground crew tried to troubleshoot the problem three times, only for the leak to persist and force NASA to call off the launch attempt. On Friday, engineers also replaced the seal on a 4-inch hydrogen “bleed line” that was responsible for a smaller leak during an earlier August 29th launch attempt, and after that NASA plans to conduct a fueling test for the verification of they’re working as intended. For dry run engineers attempt to load 736,000 gallons of liquid hydrogen and oxygen it would need during a regular flight.
On 17th September NASA hopes to complete that test as early as possible. The agency said, “This demonstration will allow engineers to check the new seals under cryogenic, or supercold, conditions as expected on launch day and before proceeding to the next launch attempt,”. On Thursday, NASA announced it was targeting September 23rd for another go at putting Artemis 1 into space.
