The countdown for NASA’s Artemis II wet dress rehearsal was paused late Monday night at Kennedy Space Center with just minutes remaining before the simulated launch countdown, before ultimately concluding early Tuesday morning.
Following the two-day rehearsal, NASA announced it will move the mission’s earliest launch opportunity to March.
Huntsville plays a central role in the Artemis II mission through NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, which manages the Space Launch System program.
Marshall engineers oversee critical rocket hardware, including the Orion stage adapter that connects the Orion spacecraft to the rocket, as well as flight software and launch support.
The wet dress rehearsal, often called a WDR, is a practice run that follows the same timeline used on launch day. It is called “wet” because the rocket is fully loaded with its super-cold liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen propellants, just as it will be for liftoff.
The only thing that does not happen during the WDR is ignition of the engines.
At T-minus 10 minutes, the countdown entered a hold at 8:50 p.m. EST as teams worked through remaining closeout activities. According to NASA, the wet dress rehearsal proceeded as engineers continued evaluating systems and completing planned objectives.
In a post-test update, NASA said the agency successfully completed the wet dress rehearsal, including fully loading cryogenic propellant, sending teams to the launch pad to close out the Orion spacecraft, and safely draining the rocket.
Engineers encountered several challenges during the two-day test but met many of the rehearsal’s key objectives.
NASA officials said data from the test will now be reviewed before proceeding with another wet dress rehearsal, pushing the earliest possible launch opportunity for Artemis II to March.
“To allow teams to review data and conduct a second wet dress rehearsal, NASA now will target March as the earliest possible launch opportunity for the flight test,” the agency said in its statement.
Agency leaders will discuss initial results from the wet dress rehearsal during a news conference on Tuesday afternoon.
With the shift to a March launch window, Artemis II astronauts were released from quarantine, which began Jan. 21 in Houston. NASA said the crew will re-enter quarantine approximately two weeks before the next targeted launch opportunity.
Artemis II is scheduled to carry four astronauts on a mission around the moon, marking NASA’s first crewed lunar flight since Apollo 17 in 1972. The mission will test spacecraft systems and operations ahead of future lunar landings.
