NASA’s Artemis 1 lunar rocket, the first spacecraft booster, stands on top of launch pad 39B at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, while the International Space Station flies over them as a strip visible in the upper left corner on April 8, 2022. (Image: NASA / Joel Cowski)
A new calm photo from NASA captured two spacecraft in twilight, one in orbit and one on Earth, as the agency tested its new lunar rocket Artemis 1.
Photo by photographer Joel Cousky shows the lunar rocket of Artemis 1 – the first amplifier of the Space Launch System – while standing on launch pad 39B at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on April 8. Above, a vague strip of sky is the International Space Station, which orbits 260 miles (418 km) above Earth.
Cousky took the photo with a 30-second exposure and a Nikon D6 camera, according to a description of the NASA photo. The SLS rocket is a bit difficult to recognize, as it is partially obscured by overexposed spotlights on its launch pad, but the stunning colors of dusk, ranging from deep pink-orange to black at night, more than make up for it.
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NASA launched the SLS rocket to the launch site in March for a critical countdown and refueling test, known as the “wet rehearsal”, ahead of the planned Artemis 1 mission to the moon later this year. The test started on April 1, but did not go smoothly.
NASA tried to load the rocket three separate times, only to cancel each attempt due to technical problems. A faulty Artemis 1 launch tower valve is the reason for the last delay.
The Artemis 1 mission is an unmanned test flight that will launch the Orion spacecraft, full of experiments and mannequins around the moon. If the flight goes well, NASA will launch the first astronauts on an SLS rocket in 2024 in the Artemis 2 mission, which will also fly around the moon. The next mission, Artemis 3, will bring astronauts to land near the moon’s south pole in 2025 or 2026, NASA said.
Send Tariq Malik an email to tmalik@space.com or follow @tariqjmalik. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Instagram.
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