Artemis launch live updates: Countdown on hold amid engine issue

Orlando Sentinel ^ | 8.29.2022 | Richard Tribou

[rarestia]

Sounds like a stuck valve on engine 3. They have a 2 hour launch window starting at 0830 ET.

[Psalm 73]

They clain it's the most powerful rocket ever - but not when you compare its stats with the Saturn V rocket.

Saturn V is still the king.

[V_TWIN]

There is also weather up and down the coast that might play a part....can’t completly discount that dynamic anyway.

[nagant]

DUH!!!!

Stop blowing the polyurethane foam with water, and start blowing it with CFC.

[Guenevere]

They are touting 100,000 have/will arrive to watch this.

[rarestia]

Well, this is the first flight test for SLS. I suspect they want nominal conditions to baseline their data.

[BikerJoe]

Saturn V is still the king.

...and gets a pass for being 60 years old. What bothers me about Artemis is, after 7 years of SpaceX landing boosters, they're going to throw away 4 perfectly good SSMEs every launch.

[pnz1]

So is countdown clock still at 40 min?

[hoagy62]

I think they’re experiencing ‘new toy syndrome’. They have a new rocket that they’ve spent billions on and they want to be sure when it launches that it doesn’t explode.

Quite frankly, since it’s already YEARS late and BILLIONS over budget, this is has already gotten frustrating.

Last night, my wife (who is not a space nut like I am) brought up a very good point: WHY is NASA building something that looks and acts like the ‘old stuff’?

She has a point. The SLS, while bigger and more powerful than the Saturn V, is still just a big one-use throwaway rocket. Why have we not done a better version of the Shuttle? Why have we not built an SSTO (Single Stage To Orbit) launch vehicle? This seems like a huge waste of money.

SpaceX, with Starship and the BFR Booster (if/when they can get it up and running) might be the way to go.

[V_TWIN]

Agreed.

I’m about 150 miles north and it’s socked in and completely overcast here right now.

[Pollard]

An earlier noted potential issue of what seemed to be a crack seen in the inner tank has in NASA engineers’ opinion been not in the actual tank, but in the foam that insulates tank.

[V_TWIN]

According to the NASA twitter feed the launch is currently in an unplanned hold as the team works on an issue with engine number 3

[hoagy62]

So is countdown clock still at 40 min?

Yep. The engineers are still working the Engine 3 problem.

[rarestia]

Yeah, that’s a planned hold.

[OHPatriot]

A single F-1 Engine, 1.5 Million Pounds of Thrust. The F-1A, was estimated at 1.8 Million and the “Computer Modeled” F-1B is expected to be slightly above that IF IT IS EVER BUILT.

The RS-25s are 512,000Lbs each, so with enough of them you could surpass the mighty Saturn-V.

I Bet that NASA never will build the F-1Bs, because “Heavy Lift” is not NASA’s main focus. Remember it’s Muslim Outreach!!

[rarestia]

I’m of the opinion we need two development systems: one government-led and one private industry. The government-led program should be slow burn and all about efficiency. The private industry-led program should be bleeding edge.

The problem is that government is a waste magnet, and Boeing has been proven to be risk averse to the point of paralysis.

[telescope115]

I started watching while the countdown was still in progress.
I am watching NASA TV on my TV, and a live channel on YouTube on my tablet.
While the countdown clock was running, I noticed that the YouTube channel was approximately 90 seconds AHEAD of the NASA TV app.

[hoagy62]

SCRUBBED.

[pnz1]

Scrubbed.