For NASA and its astronauts, the moon is no farther away in terms of distance, but it is slipping further into the future.
Officials at the space agency announced on Tuesday that Artemis II, the first American mission to send astronauts close to the moon in more than 50 years, will not take place late this year, as had been scheduled.
They set a target date of September 2025 for the mission, which will swing around the moon without landing there.
The delay in Artemis II also pushes back the subsequent mission, Artemis III, which is to land two astronauts on the moon near its south pole. That will now occur no earlier than September 2026.
Artemis II will be the first mission to send astronauts to space using NASA’s huge Space Launch System rocket and Orion capsule, and NASA officials want to fix potential problems that could endanger the crew.
“We don’t fly until it’s ready,” Bill Nelson, the NASA administrator, said Tuesday. “Safety is paramount.”
For the mission’s delay, the officials cited a slew of technical issues including concerns about electronics in the life support system that will keep the astronauts alive inside Orion, continuing analysis of wear and tear of the capsule’s heat shield during an earlier uncrewed mission and repairs to the launch tower.
Unlike the Apollo missions, Artemis II will not enter orbit around the moon. The Orion capsule will swing around the moon, using lunar gravity to sling it back to Earth for a Pacific Ocean splashdown. The entire trip should take around 10 days.
The crew will consist of three NASA astronauts and one Canadian astronaut.
Amit Kshatriya, the deputy associate administrator in charge of the Moon to Mars program at NASA, said the discovery of problems with the valves in the Orion capsule’s life support system was the main cause for the Artemis II delay.
Valves that were destined for the Orion capsule for Artemis III failed in tests. The valve components for Artemis II had passed tests and had been installed, but “it became very clear to us that it was unacceptable to accept that hardware, and we need to replace it in order to guarantee the safety of the crew,” Kshatriya said.