At the weekend NASA was forced to scrub the launch of its Artemis 1 mission once again.

Following a failed launch attempt early last week, NASA finally decided to give the launch one more shot on Saturday. Unfortunately that launch was not to be.

The launch was scrubbed this time around after a hydrogen leak was discovered in the quick disconnect between the liquid hydrogen fuel feed line and the Space Launch System.

“Multiple troubleshooting efforts to address the area of the leak by reseating a seal in the quick disconnect where liquid hydrogen is fed into the rocket did not fix the issue,” NASA said on Saturday.

Rather than trying to speed run a fix, NASA’s mission managers have decided to forego additional launch attempts in early September.

The space faring agency says that it will conduct an assessment over the next few days that will inform whether a seal can be replaced on the launch pad or whether it needs to go back into the Vehicle Assembly Building.

This is a lot of work to do and NASA has elected to scrub launch attempts for the remainder of early September. The next launch window is from 19th September to 4th October (excluding 29th and 30th September) with 14 possible launch opportunities.

Picking a launch window is one of the more important aspects of a rocket launch. For one, the spacecraft has to be able to reach the point where the Orion capsule can be separated for its jaunt around the Moon.

The launch window must also allow for a daylight splashdown of the Orion capsule. You can read more about the criteria for a launch window here.

[Source – NASA]