ORLANDO, Fla. — NASA began its tanking test of the Space Launch System core and upper stage Wednesday at Kennedy Space Center that could pave the way for the Artemis I launch to the moon next week, but a new leak in a fuel line yet again gave NASA headaches.
The test that got the go to proceed at 7:30 a.m. Eastern time at Launch Pad 39-B looks to make sure repairs to fuel lines made since a scrub on Sept. 3 can support the more than 730,000 gallons of cryogenic liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen that needs to flow into the core stage as well as the upper Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stage of SLS.
But a new leak in the same line that caused that scrub was detected as NASA halted liquid hydrogen fueling shortly before 10 a.m.
