NASA’s new moon rocket heads to pad ahead of astronaut launch

WASHINGTON, 18th January, 2026 (WAM) — The US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) announced on Saturday the start of transferring its new giant rocket to the launch pad at the Kennedy Space Centre, in preparation for a high-stakes mission scheduled for early February that aims to send astronauts around the Moon and return them to Earth. It will be the first crewed lunar flight of its kind in more than 50 years.

The rocket, standing 98 metres tall, began its journey at a speed of about one mile per hour from the Vehicle Assembly Building at the Kennedy Space Centre at dawn. The rollout to the launch pad, a distance of around six kilometres, is expected to continue through the night.

The rollout marks the second test of the Space Launch System (SLS) and the first to carry a crew. Four astronauts will live inside the Orion capsule, where they will test life-support systems and communications, as well as conduct manoeuvring rehearsals in space.

The SLS is the most powerful rocket NASA has built to date, generating nearly 15 percent more thrust at liftoff than the Saturn V rocket used in the 1960s.

The mission is part of the Artemis programme, a multi-billion-dollar effort that follows an uncrewed test flight in 2022 and sets the stage for Artemis 3, which aims to land astronauts near the Moon’s south pole as soon as possible and establish a sustainable lunar base as a future launch point for missions to Mars.