NASA started the final stages of testing earlier this month for Space Launch System (SLS), which will be the rocket that propels America’s next mission to the moon.
When completed, SLS will be the most powerful rocket ever built and the only one powerful enough to carry the Orion spacecraft, astronauts and supplies to the moon in one launch.
According to NASA, the test tank is identical to the flight version of the fuel tank which holds 196,000 gallons of cryogenic liquid oxygen.
NASA and Boeing have worked to assemble SLS components at NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans. The test tank was delivered to Huntsville from New Orleans aboard NASA’s Pegasus barge on July 9.
Senator Richard Shelby (R-AL) highlighted the importance of SLS within America’s space program earlier this year when he told a NASA official, “What’s important is to build that rocket and build it right.”
A time-lapse video provided by NASA shows a team of engineers working with a heavy-duty crane to carefully guide the test tank into place at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville.
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