After considerable delays, humans are one step closer to returning to the Moon. On Wednesday morning just before 2 AM, NASA finally launched Artemis 1, an unmanned mission that will send a rocket around the Moon, from its Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Though unmanned, the spacecraft carried a module that is designed to carry humans. The rocket on which the module traveled is known as Orion, and is NASA's flagship rocket for future Moon missions.
Originally slated for lift-off on August 29, four different delays pushed the mission back to November 16th. The repeated delays were a result of extreme caution on behalf of NASA, given the mission's expense: NASA estimates it will spend $95 billion on the Artemis project up till 2025, with each launch, including this one, costing about $4.1 billion. The delays were partially due to the pure hydrogen fuel tanks, which proved to be finicky.
