WASHINGTON (REUTERS) - Nasa's deep space exploration rocket built by Boeing briefly ignited all four engines of its behemoth core stage for the first time on Saturday (Jan 16), cutting short a crucial test to advance a years-delayed US government programme to return humans to the moon in the next few years.
Mounted in a test facility at Nasa's Stennis Space Centre in Mississippi, the Space Launch System's 212-foot (65m) tall core stage roared to life at 4.27pm local time (6.27am Singapore time) for just over a minute - well short of the roughly four minutes engineers needed to stay on track for the rocket's first launch in November this year.
The engine test, the last leg of Nasa's nearly year-long "Green Run" test campaign, was a vital step for the space agency and its top Space Launch System contractor Boeing before a debut unmanned launch later this year under Nasa's Artemis programme, the Trump administration's push to return US astronauts to the moon by 2024.
It was unclear whether Boeing and Nasa would have to repeat the test, a prospect that could push the debut launch into 2022.
To simulate internal conditions of a real liftoff, the rocket's four Aerojet Rocketdyne RS-25 engines ignited for roughly one minute and 15 seconds, generating 1.6 million pounds (726 tons) of thrust and consuming 700,000 gallons (2.6 million litres) of propellants on Nasa's largest test stand, a massive facility towering 35 stories tall.
The expendable super heavy-lift Space Launch System is three years behind schedule and nearly US$3 billion (S$4 billion) over budget. Critics have long argued for Nasa to retire the rocket's shuttle-era core technologies, which have launch costs of US$1 billion or more per mission, in favour of newer commercial alternatives that promise lower costs.
By comparison, it costs as little as US$90 million to fly the massive but less powerful Falcon Heavy rocket designed and manufactured by billionaire tech entrepreneur Elon Musk's SpaceX, and some US$350 million per launch for United Launch Alliance's legacy Delta IV Heavy.
While newer, more reusable rockets from both companies - SpaceX's Starship and United Launch Alliance's Vulcan - promise heavier lift capacity than the Falcon Heavy or Delta IV Heavy potentially at lower cost, backers of the Space Launch System argue that it would take two or more launches on those rockets to launch what the system could carry in a single mission.
Reuters reported in October that President-elect Joe Biden's space advisers aim to delay Mr Donald Trump's 2024 goal, casting fresh doubts on the long-term fate of the Space Launch System just as SpaceX and billionaire Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin scramble to bring rival new heavy-lift capacity to market.
Nasa and Boeing engineers have stayed on a 10-month schedule for the Green Run "despite having significant adversity this year", Boeing's Space Launch System manager John Shannon told reporters this week, citing five tropical storms and a hurricane that hit Stennis, as well as a three-month closure after some engineers tested positive for the coronavirus in March.
