NASA's New Mega-Rocket (SLS), Orion Capsule on Track for Future Test Flights

Artist's rendering of NASA's Space Launch System (SLS) rocket being stacked inside the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB).

Credit: NASA

A new era of space exploration, supported by a history-making new mega-rocket and a spacecraft designed to deliver humans into deep space, could be on the horizon for NASA.

The space agency is gearing up to build the largest and most powerful rocket in history.

The huge launcher, called the Space Launch System (SLS), will move a new spacecraft dubbed Orion, designed to send up to four astronauts farther into the solar system than ever before.

A short list of destinations includes the moon, nearby asteroids and, eventually, Mars.

Everyone is looking forward to 2021, the year when the first manned launch will occur but before that happens, the rocket and spacecraft will have to pass a number of tests.



Most powerful rocket ever
NASA's SLS rocket might remind some space fans of the mighty Saturn V rocket used to launch Apollo moon landing flights in the 1960s and 1970s; however, the new launcher will be more powerful.

NASA currently envisions the SLS in two configurations: one weighing 77 tons and able to lift more than 154,000 pounds, another weighing 143 tons and able to lift more than 286,000 pounds.

The smaller configuration, which is expected to carry a crew of astronauts, will create 8.4 million pounds of thrust, 10 percent more than the massive Saturn V rocket.

The larger configuration, which will carry cargo, will create 9.2 million pounds of thrust, 20 percent more than a Saturn V.

This version will be as tall as a 38-story building. The SLS will truly be a mountain of a machine.

For its power, the SLS will rely on two solid rocket boosters in addition to the huge, 200-foot-tall (61 meters) core stage, which will carry liquid hydrogen and oxygen to fuel four RS-25 rocket engine.

The RS-25 rocket engine is a workhorse: It powered the space shuttle and "operated with 100-percent mission success during 135 space shuttle missions," according to a NASA statement.

The power produced by the three engines is equal to that from 12 Hoover Dams.

NASA currently has a stockpile of 16 RS-25 rocket engines at the Stennis Space Center, in Mississippi.

The engines themselves had to be modified to put out more power than they did for the space shuttle missions, and therefore still require testing. Those tests will probably occur in mid-July, NASA has said.

NASA Orion capsule moving to 2014 launch: Future Asteroid Exploration

A crane lifts the Orion EFT-1 crew module from its birdcage processing stand for transfer to dolly for continued assembly inside the Operations and Checkout Building high bay at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida as workers monitor progress. 

Orion’s first unpiloted test flight is scheduled to launch in 2014. 

Credit: NASA/Frankie Martin 

NASA is picking up the construction pace on the inaugural space-bound Orion crew capsule at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida and accelerating towards blastoff on the unmanned Exploration Flight Test-1 mission (EFT-1) slated for September 2014.

The Orion capsule is being constructed in the Orion manufacturing assembly facility in the Operations and Checkout Building (O & C) and will be mounted atop a mammoth Delta 4 Heavy Booster which will one day lead to deep space human forays to Asteroids and Mars.

"We plan to power up Orion for the first time this summer," said Scott Wilson, Orion's Production Operations manager for NASA at KSC stated to a group of reporters.

EFT-1 Mission
The Orion EFT-1 flight is a critical first step towards achieving NASA's new goal of capturing and retrieving a Near Earth Asteroid for eventual visit by astronauts flying aboard an Orion vehicle by 2021 – if NASA's proposed budget request is approved.

KSC will have a leading role in NASA's asteroid retrieval project that could occur some four years earlier than President Obama's targeted goal of 2025 for a human journey to an asteroid.

Capturing an asteroid and dispatching astronauts aboard Orion to collect precious rock samples is reputed to aid the scientific understanding of the formation of the Solar System as well as bolster Planetary Defense strategies.

The importance of understanding NEOs and Asteroids is gathering more interest, following the unforeseen Russian meteor strike in February which injured over 1200 people and damaged over 3000 buildings.