U.S. Space and Science

NASA rolled the 322‑foot SLS and Orion on a daylong, roughly 1‑mph, four‑mile move from the Vehicle Assembly Building to pad 39B, where thousands of Kennedy Space Center workers and families, joined by NASA officials and the Artemis II crew, watched as teams prepared for a full wet‑dress fueling rehearsal. Engineers began loading more than 750,000 gallons of supercold liquid oxygen and hydrogen in a simulated 9 p.m. ET countdown — practicing recycle and scrub drills, then draining and reviewing data — after a two‑day cold‑weather delay that pushed the earliest possible launch from Feb. 6 to Feb. 8; only Feb. 8, 10 and 11 remain in the February window, and NASA could clear the crew for a possible Feb. 8 (about 11:20 p.m. ET) fly‑around if the test data look good. Managers say lessons from Artemis I’s propellant and heat‑shield issues have been incorporated into new loading procedures and launch director Charlie Blackwell‑Thompson expressed confidence the teams can complete the test without major leaks, with the astronauts remaining in quarantine until the data review.