NASA’s Space Launch System moon rocket began its four-mile, 11-hour journey to its launchpad Tuesday night.
The 322-foot-tall rocket is being prepared for its first test launch on August 29. No astronaut crew will be onboard. The test launch will orbit the moon before coming back to Earth’s surface 42 hours later.
The rocket is part of NASA’s Artemis program, an attempt to take humans back to the lunar surface with the aim of using it as practice for missions to Mars.
NASA hopes to have two people on Mars for a 30-day mission by the late 2030s or early 2040s.
Travel to the moon takes roughly three days and covers a distance of around 240,000 miles. Traveling to Mars is a much longer ordeal, taking seven months and approximately 300 million miles to get there.
Scientists at NASA have been interested in Mars for a long time, as “its formation and evolution are comparable to Earth,” perhaps giving insight into Earth’s past and future.
During an actual crewed launch, the capsule at the tip of the rocket will separate and shuttle astronauts to a second spacecraft that will bring them to the moon’s surface.
In 2019, China and Russia made plans to set up permanent lunar research stations on the moon by 2026.
NASA Administrator Bill Nelson expressed concerns in July that China would one day attempt to have control over the moon, monopolizing all exploration of it.
China immediately denied the claim.
Space security experts believe this would be an arduous undertaking, not to mention illegal under international space law. Still, competition remains between the U.S. and China over lunar development.
