In the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, workers help secure the second of two Artemis I aft booster segments for the Space Launch System onto the mobile launcher in High Bay 3 on Nov. 24, 2020. In view at right are the first aft booster segments secured on the mobile launcher. Workers with Exploration Ground Systems and contractor Jacobs teams will stack the twin five-segment boosters on the mobile launcher over a number of weeks. When the core stage arrives, it will join the boosters on the mobile launcher, followed by the interim cryogenic propulsion stage and Orion spacecraft. Manufactured by Northrop Grumman in Utah, the twin boosters provide more than 75 percent of the total SLS thrust at launch. The SLS is managed by Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. The first in a series of increasingly complex missions, Artemis I will test the Orion spacecraft and SLS as an integrated system ahead of crewed flights to the Moon.
Photo credit: NASA/Glenn Benson