NASA is already preparing for Artemis III after the success of Artemis II, the mission that returned humans to the moon for the first time in half a century.
The Crawler-Transporter – the massive vehicle that moves the mobile launch pad and the SLS rocket that launches Orion from the hangar to the launch site – will start its trek at Kennedy Space Center later this week. It will return the launch platform to the Vehicle Assembly Building, where the assembly of Artemis III's rocket will begin.
John Giles, NASA's Crawler Element Operations Manager, oversees the Crawler-Transporter. His team will adjust the 22-million-pound load to keep it as level as possible on the incline in their path.
"It's exciting and yet high focused attention," Giles said. "You don't want to do anything wrong. You want to make sure everything goes perfect, which it has every time."
The fuel tank for the SLS rocket will join other parts of the rocket already at the Kennedy Space Center later this month.
"After all this hard work for Artemis II, everybody was kind of hoping, okay, we're gonna celebrate this achievement and this milestone. We're gonna take a few days off," Giles said. "They immediately said, 'Oh no, we're gonna roll back right away. We're gonna start processing for Artemis III.' And we're like, wow, okay, they're serious about this."
NASA aims to launch Artemis III in 2027, where it will stay in low-Earth orbit and test commercial lunar landers from SpaceX or Blue Origin. The crew will soon be named, according to NASA.
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