Although in principle everything was ready for launch, it was a possibility that was on the table, although it is true that we hoped that it would not be so or, in any case, that it was due to weather conditions, because as we told you a few days ago, the weather reports pointed to a 30% chance that the weather conditions would prevent launch will take place. The weather, finally, has turned out to be benevolent (although it had caused an advance of 45 minutes over the initially scheduled time), but even so the SLS has not been able to trace the flight a few hours ago.

So what is the problem? Well, as reported by the US space agency, the launch director of Artemis I, Charlie Blackwell-Thomspon, has been forced to cancel the launch due to a problem detected in one of the four engines of the SLS. Or, to be more exact, in the systems dedicated to cooling it in the pre-launch phase, a key procedure to guarantee the safety of the operation.

Although the weather had finally given room for the launch, the risk of a lightning strike on Artemis I, estimated by meteorologists at 20%, has caused the day to start, if not on the wrong foot, then in a certain hurry, as has delayed the process of loading the fuel (liquid nitrogen) used by the SLS. The engineering teams carried out all the work prior to loading, so the race was over, but when it was determined that the risk had been mitigated, the nearly 3,785 cubic meters of liquid nitrogen and oxygen needed were loaded. for launch.

Until that point, despite the advance in time and the delay in loading the fuel, everything seemed to be going well, but the situation has become more complicated when the systems responsible for said operation have been unable to cool one of the SLS engines. This procedure is key, since nitrogen is charged at a very, very low temperature, so the engines must be conditioned so that there is not too high a contrast between its temperature and that of the fuel.

The worst part of this is not that the launch has been suspended because, as we told you a few days ago, there are two other optimal launch windows, the next days September 2 and 5. The problem is that the technicians and engineers have not been able to detect the reason for the failure in the systems, so of course, they have not been able to solve it. Thus, now they face a race against time to identify the cause, solve it, carry out the tests that are necessary to guarantee the safety of the launch and, with everything ready, reactivate the countdown.