KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. -- It was a big day for NASA as their Mobile Launcher moved toward Exploration Mission-1 at Kennedy Space Center.
- NASA moved the Mobile Launcher from an outdoor site to Vehicle Assembly Building
- The launcher will eventually be used for the Space Launch System rocket
- Testing will begin in about 7 months
- RELATED: Rocket launch schedule
NASA is hoping to get back to the moon and beyond with this upgraded mobile launcher.
The new launch mount was originally built for the ARES-1 rocket, which was scrapped. It had to be modified for the bigger and more powerful Space Launch System rocket to cater for four RS-25 engines and two Solid Rocket Boosters.
According to NASA Mobile Launcher Project Manager Cliff Lanham, the mobile launcher will stay at the Vehicle Assembly Building for the next few months before testing.
“After seven months, the crawler will come back in and will pick up the mobile launcher and head to the pad for testing for five months,” Lanham said.
The mobile launcher is about 380 feet tall, and and around 5,000 tons.
“The way we like to compare it is we build a skyscraper you can move around. The weight is about 11 million pounds, but with everything like the crawler and rocket it's 21 million pounds,” explained Lanham.
According to NASA, The SLS rocket is the most powerful rocket in the world, and will send the Orion spacecraft farther than any spacecraft built for humans has ever flown.
Completed in 2010, the mobile launcher made its first trip to the Launch Pad 39B in 2011.
“The next time we roll the launcher in VAB like this will be when we are ready to build up the rocket and get ready for the 2020 launch,” explained Lanham.