Nasa’s moon rocket began its journey to the launch pad on Thursday.
Taking off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, it began the four-mile journey from the Vehicle Assembly Building to the launch pad.
The crawler-transporter moved slowly during the voyage to the launch pad, with a top cruising speed of 0.82 mph.
Its journey was expected to take up to 12 hours.
The rocket Nasa’s Space Launch System (SLS) is the most powerful rocket ever built and weighs 5.75 million pounds.
It was venturing to the launch pad for a wet dress rehearsal ahead of the uncrewed Artemis I launch later this year which will see it travel around the Moon.
The journey was being made in preparation for engineers to conduct final tests on the rocket, spacecraft and its exploration ground systems.
The rehearsal will run the Artemis I launch team through operations to load propellant into the rocket’s tanks.
It will conduct a full launch countdown, demonstrate the ability to recycle the countdown clock, drain the tanks to give them an opportunity to practice the timelines and procedures they will use for launch, Nasa said.
Teams will load more than 700,000 gallons of cryogenic, or super cold, propellants including liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen into the rocket at the launch pad.
This will be according to the detailed timeline they will use on the actual launch day.
Engineers will practice every phase of the countdown including weather briefings, pre-planned holds in the countdown, conditioning and replenishing the propellants as needed and validation checks.
Several days after the wet dress rehearsal, the integrated rocket and spacecraft will be rolled back to the Vehicle Assembly Building.
Nasa will review data from the rehearsal before setting a specific target launch date for the Artemis I launch which was hoped to be no later than May 2022.
This could pave the way for the Artemis II mission with a crewed flight.
