There Artemis II mission – which will bring man back around the Moon for the first time in 54 years – has been officially postponed: this was confirmed by the NASA administrator, Jared Isaacmanwho through a post on X communicated the decision by the US Space Agency to postpone the launch, initially scheduled for February 6, 2026 and already postponed to February 9, 2026.
At the moment, therefore, i four astronauts who will undertake a journey around our natural satellite will not leave before March 6 (considering that the second launch window extends from March 6 to 11, 2026, with March 10 excluded), but the date could be postponed further to April, for the third launch window (April 1, 3, 4, 5, 6).
The reasons for the postponement will be clarified in detail in a press conference that NASA will hold today at 18:00 (Italian time), but Isaacman has already anticipated that the mission was postponed after a series of problems emerged during the wet dress rehearsalthe simulation of all launch operations (including loading propellant onto the rocket) until shortly before ignition of the engines.
«With more than three years between the two launches of the SLS rocketswe expected to encounter difficulties. This is precisely why we conducted the wet dress rehearsal: These tests are designed to identify any problems before the flight and prepare for launch day with the greatest probability of success.” According to the little information now available, during the simulation, the teams would have had to face several problems, including one loss of liquid hydrogen exceeding the permitted limitsi during the refueling of the central core, near the area that connects the SLS rocket to the ground structures (visible in the video below).
After fully charging the SLS system, the technicians experienced aanother anomaly during operations relating to the Orion capsule: after closing the door, in fact, it seems that a valve in the capsule’s pressurization system was “incorrectly vented”, with the team having to simulate the operation again, causing a further delay on the schedule.
During thelast phase of the countdown, one finally occurred new loss of liquid hydrogen: NASA technicians only counted down to T-5 minutesbefore the ground launch sequencer would interrupt operations due to the increased leakage rate.
The same problem, by the way, it had already been encountered for the Artemis I missionwhich for this very reason was postponed by about 6 months. The postponement of the launch to the Moon, therefore, does not come unexpectedly: considering that Artemis IIunlike the first mission, will have crew on board of the Orion capsule, the safety standards for launch are even higher than in the past.
But what will happen now? While waiting for NASA’s press conference, we know for sure that the Space Agency will have to schedule a new date for the wet dress rehearsal: if the entire simulation is free of anomalies, the astronauts will be able to prepare for the March 2026 launch window.
