Enlarge / A technician works on part of the Space Launch System rocket’s core stage for Artemis II in this March 2023 image. (credit: NASA/Michael DeMocker )

Welcome to Edition 6.06 of the Rocket Report! This week's news in space lift includes ups and downs for small launch companies, yet another record for SpaceX's blistering launch cadence, and some non-news on Europe's Ariane 6 rocket that still bears mentioning. We also provide updates on the world's two super-heavy lift rockets—NASA's Space Launch System and SpaceX's Starship/Super Heavy.

As always, we welcome reader submissions , and if you don't want to miss an issue, please subscribe using the box below (the form will not appear on AMP-enabled versions of the site). Each report will include information on small-, medium-, and heavy-lift rockets, as well as a quick look ahead at the next three launches on the calendar.

Virgin Galactic flies first private passengers . Richard Branson's private suborbital spaceflight company performed its second commercial flight to the edge of space Thursday. This was Virgin Galactic's first flight with private passengers onboard, Ars reports . Virgin Galactic's first commercial flight in June carried government astronauts for Italy.

Enlarge / The SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft are seen before the Artemis I launch. (credit: Trevor Mahlmann)

A Colorado-based company, Wilson Aerospace, is suing Boeing for what it claims to be "theft" of its intellectual property. At issue is a specific tool, known as a Fluid Fitting Torque Device-3, that Wilson developed, and Boeing said it needed to attach four main engines to the Space Launch System rocket.

The lawsuit was filed Tuesday in US District Court in Seattle, where Boeing was originally based. The lawsuit alleges that Boeing reached out to Wilson in March 2014 after learning that the company had created the special torque device, which can precisely install high-torque fittings and nuts in tightly confined spaces.

The engine section at the bottom of the Space Launch System rocket, where four RS-25 engines are mated to the large core stage with its propellant and oxidizer tanks, is one such tight space. Boeing is the prime contractor for the core stage of the Space Launch System rocket, which launched NASA's uncrewed Artemis I mission around the Moon in November 2022.

Enlarge / NASA's Space Launch System rocket may be rolling back to the Vehicle Assembly Building on Sunday night, or maybe not. (credit: Trevor Mahlmann)

NASA on Saturday announced that it will no longer attempt to launch its Artemis I mission on Tuesday, September 27, as Tropical Storm Ian continues developing in the Caribbean Sea.

Instead of preparing the massive Space Launch System rocket for liftoff in three days, teams at Kennedy Space Center in Florida will instead start to configure the ground systems and vehicle for a potential roll back to a large hangar, the Vehicle Assembly Building. Sheltering inside this building would protect the $4 billion rocket and Orion spacecraft from any foul weather due to Ian.

Earlier, NASA had said it would make a decision by Saturday afternoon on whether to roll the Artemis I mission back inside the hangar. However, in its announcement on Saturday the agency said it would now make that decision on Sunday.

Enlarge / NASA's Space Launch System rocket at LC-39B on September 1st, 2022.

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. —America's space agency on Saturday sought to launch a rocket largely cobbled together from the space shuttle, which itself was designed and built more than four decades ago.

As the space shuttle often was delayed due to technical problems, it therefore comes as scant surprise that the debut launch of NASA's Space Launch System rocket scrubbed a few hours before its launch window opened. The showstopper was an 8-inch diameter line carrying liquid hydrogen into the rocket. It sprang a persistent leak at the inlet, known as a quick-disconnect, leading on board the vehicle.

Valiantly, the launch team at Kennedy Space Center tried three different times to stanch the leak, all to no avail. Finally at 11:17 am ET, hours behind on their timeline to fuel the rocket, launch director Charlie Blackwell-Thompson called a halt.

Enlarge / The SLS rocket may launch on Saturday from Kennedy Space Center in Florida. (credit: Trevor Mahlmann)

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. —Five days after NASA's first attempt to fly the massive Space Launch System rocket ended with technical problems, the space agency is ready to try again.

A launch team began fueling the rocket on Saturday morning shortly before the Sun began rising over the Atlantic Ocean waters that encircle the spaceport. The SLS rocket, which is launching the Artemis I mission around the Moon, has a two-hour launch window that opens at 2:17 pm ET (18:17 UTC).

A successful launch would mark the beginning of a 42-day mission that will send the Orion spacecraft into lunar orbit, and test critical technologies such as a heat shield that will protect the spacecraft during a fiery reentry through Earth's atmosphere. If the mission goes well, Artemis II would follow in a couple of years, carrying humans around the Moon. A lunar landing is planned for later this decade.

Enlarge / NASA's SLS rocket may now launch on Saturday, September 3, 2022. (credit: Trevor Mahlmann)

After scrubbing a launch attempt of the Space Launch System rocket on Monday, NASA officials said they're working toward a second attempt to fly the Artemis I mission on Saturday, September 3.

NASA flight controllers halted the first launch attempt after they were unable to verify that one of the SLS rocket's four main engines—engine no. 3—had been properly cooled to a temperature of -420 degrees Fahrenheit prior to ignition. The engines must be chilled to very cold temperatures in order to handle the injection of very cold liquid hydrogen and oxygen propellants.

During a news conference on Tuesday evening, NASA's program manager for the SLS rocket, John Honeycutt, said his engineering team believed the engine had actually cooled down from ambient temperature to near the required level but that it was not properly measured by a faulty temperature sensor.

Enlarge / The SLS rocket did not leave the planet on Monday morning.

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. —Despite all of the hard work by its engineers and technicians, NASA did not really get close to firing up the massive Space Launch System (SLS) rocket on Monday.

The rocket experienced several issues during the countdown early on Monday before running into a technical problem the launch team could not solve: an RS-25 rocket engine that did not properly chill down prior to ignition. Even if the engine problem had been resolved, weather along the Florida coast on Monday morning proved dicier than anticipated.

Space is hard, certainly. But Monday's attempt—which NASA had promoted heavily by inviting celebrities to the launch and which included a visit by Vice President Kamala Harris—was perhaps a bit rushed. Why? Because NASA rolled a rocket out to launch without accounting for all of the things that could go wrong.

Enlarge / NASA's Space Launch System, reflected in the turn basin at the Kenendy Space Center in Florida. (credit: Trevor Mahlmann)

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. —It is time.

Shortly after midnight local time, NASA began loading liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen on board its Space Launch System rocket ahead of a Monday morning launch attempt.

It is difficult to overstate the significance of this mission for NASA. This will be the space agency's first launch of one of its own rockets since 2011, the final mission of the space shuttle. Even more significantly, this Artemis I mission is the first stepping stone on a path that could lead NASA, along with a bevy of international partners, back to the Moon and on to Mars.

Enlarge / NASA's Space Launch System Rocket at LC-39B, preparing to lift off at 8:33 am ET on August 29th, 2022. (credit: Trevor Mahlmann)

President Eisenhower signed the law establishing the National Aeronautics and Space Administration on July 29, 1958. At the time, the United States had put about 30 kg of small satellites into orbit. Less than 11 years later, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the Moon.

President Obama signed a NASA Authorization Act on October 11, 2010. Among its provisions, the law called on NASA to create the Space Launch System rocket and have it ready for launch in 2016. It seemed reasonable. At the time, NASA had been launching rockets, including very large ones, for half a century. And in some sense, this new SLS rocket was already built.

The most challenging aspect of almost any launch vehicle is its engines. No problem—the SLS rocket would use engines left over from the space shuttle program. Its side-mounted boosters would be slightly larger versions of those that powered the shuttle for three decades. The newest part of the vehicle would be its large core stage, housing liquid hydrogen and oxygen fuel tanks to feed the rocket's four main engines. But even this component was derivative. The core stage's 8.4-meter diameter was identical to the space shuttle's external tank, which carried the same propellants for the shuttle's main engines.