Adding humans to the first flight would have resulted in higher risks and could have affected future schedules for Nasa’s ultimate goal of one day landing astronauts on Mars. Photo: BloombergDallas: Nasa won’t fly humans on its first launch of the Space Launch System, the largest rocket in the agency’s history. While technically possible, the effort would have required as much as $900 million in new funding and pushed the first flight’s schedule to as late as June 2020, Nasa officials said on Friday. The agency’s current schedule calls for the initial, unmanned SLS-Orion flight to occur in 2019. On Friday, Nasa officials cited a February tornado in New Orleans that struck the Michoud Assembly Facility as one reason for delays on the rocket and Orion.

Source: Mint May 13, 2017 08:26 UTC