Starting with manufacturing and ending with stacking operations inside NASA Kennedy Space Center’s Vehicle Assembly Building, this is only the beginning of SLS’s path to the launch pad.

Video Transcript:

NASA is preparing for a journey back to the Moon, and after that, we’re setting our sights on Mars.


To get there, we need tons of rocket power, coming from our Space Launch System.

When it comes to how much power this thing can push out, this thing is massive. It’s going to be mesmerizing to stand next to this massive vehicle.

The immensity of it, knowing that this thing is going to be propelling a rocket into space and around the moon.

Hang on, it’s probably best to start back at the beginning.


It all started in Promontory, Utah, where Northrop Grumman manufactured each of the segments that make up the rocket’s boosters.

After a 10-day, cross-country journey, the booster segments were delivered to Kennedy Space Center’s Rotation, Processing, and Surge Facility, or RPSF. If this all sounds familiar, that’s because it’s the same facility that was used to process shuttle booster segments, which all came from Utah.

Then, they’re ready to go into the iconic Vehicle Assembly Building, or VAB, where the rest of the motor segments are assembled and stacked on top of the mobile launcher.

The one thing about this vehicle, of course, it’s produced all across the country. The components all come here. They may be built around the country, but they all come together right here in the Vehicle Assembly Building.


Our SLS rocket will generate 8.8 million pounds of thrust to break through Earth’s gravitational pull. That’s more power than the Space Shuttle and the Saturn V rocket used.

Teams with NASA’s Exploration Ground Systems are responsible for assembling the boosters that will house the majority of that power. The twin solid rocket boosters, made up of 10 total motor segments, will stand nearly 17 stories tall when fully stacked.

First, teams inspect and prep the hardware. Next, they’re ready to start stacking the segments – a process that takes time, patience, and a steady hand.

Once we have everything done in High Bay 4, we pick up the segment with a 325 foot crane, pick it up over the 16th-floor crossover to where you see it now, and we begin stacking the segments. Each segment we lift over the 16th-floor crossover and stack it. Once we stack it, we put it on top of the segment below, and we put about 177 pins all the way around the whole thing to attach each segment.



And, the pressure to perform the operation flawlessly can test the team’s nerves.

There’s a tremendous responsibility involved with processing flight hardware like this. It’s nerve-racking at times, but it’s exciting. There’s zero appetite for risk in a program like this.

We have a bunch of shuttle guys that are here to show us along the way. If we get stuck, they’re there to guide us. At the beginning of stacking, it was very of nerve-racking. With each segment that we stacked, a little bit of the nerve comes off. By the third or fourth one, it’s easy-peasy. We’re pushing through, all the jitters are gone, and we’re just excited to get finished with it.

With all 10 booster segments now fully stacked on the mobile launcher, there’s just one final piece of the puzzle to round out the power needed to get SLS off the ground and send it to space: core stage.


After a 900-mile voyage aboard NASA’s Pegasus barge, the SLS core stage – the
largest rocket stage NASA has ever built – has made it to Kennedy Space Center.
Today is a huge day. This is the last piece of big hardware that we need for Artemis 1 hard processing. And we’ve just been waiting a long time for this part of the vehicle to arrive so that we can get going on the next steps of our stacking operations.

Standing an impressive 212 feet tall, and weighing a whopping 188,000 pounds, the core stage came all the way from Stennis Space Center in Mississippi. The core stage went through round after round of rigorous testing, including what’s called its Green Run series, truly putting its performance to the test.

The series involved eight rounds that looked at systems individually before culminating in pure power. With over 700,000 gallons of propellant flowing through the core stage, and its RS-25 engines firing for eight minutes straight, the successful final test resulted in some big emotions from the team.

We cried, we laughed, and we cheered because it was so emotional to see
the years of culmination coming through.


And, that victory did not come without overcoming a few challenges, proving why at NASA we test as frequently and as hard as we do.

We actually did a one-minute test on the first hot-fire test and then we learned a lot from that. We understood the vehicle more, we made a few changes, and then we got back into our second hot-fire test.

There was a lot of joy and workmanship and ownership of being able to work that process and be able to get it done. When we went for the second hot fire, and we went for the 500 seconds, that was just pure exhilaration.

Following its arrival at Kennedy, teams moved the core stage into the VAB, where it was lifted by crane and placed in between the twin solid rocket boosters.



Serving as the backbone of the rocket, the core stage will provide more than 2 million pounds of thrust to help send the Orion spacecraft on its trip around the Moon.

Essentially, we have these two massive cranes that are located inside of the VAB, where we go ahead and we pick two points at the end of the core stage – one on the back portion of it and on the front portion of it – we lift it up to the point where we’re able to transition it from a horizontal position over into a vertical position, and then essentially bring it way up to the top of the Vehicle Assembly Building and cross it over into High Bay 3, in which we ensure that we don’t damage any part of the vehicle as it’s incoming into its position.

NASA’s largest rocket stage, now fully integrated with the twin boosters, is ready to get Orion off the Earth. But, it will take one more critical component to give the capsule that extra push it needs to journey tens of thousands of miles beyond the Moon.

With just a single RL10 engine, the interim cryogenic propulsion stage, or ICPS, will provide over 20,000 pounds of thrust to send Orion on the ride of a lifetime.

To connect the ICPS with the rocket stack, teams next added the launch vehicle stage adapter to the core stage, followed by the ICPS.


The ICPS is the interim cryogenic propulsion stage and essentially, it’s somewhat of the upper stage of the entire SLS vehicle. And what that will do is propel the Orion capsule along with the service module over to its destination, which at this point in time will be the Moon.

But, before the spacecraft can be attached to the rocket, teams will conduct a series of tests to ensure all of SLS’s components communicate properly with one another, plus the ground systems equipment, the Launch Control System, and its software.

Adding to the challenge, those methods for testing have changed significantly since the days of the Apollo Program.

Initially built in the 1960s to house the assembly of the Saturn V, the largest rocket made by humans at the time for Apollo missions to the Moon, the VAB has undergone some major modifications to support several different kinds of rockets and spacecraft, whether they’re going into low-Earth orbit or venturing to deep space.

This high bay was Shuttle heritage. Before that it was Apollo heritage. There’s upgrades that are still occurring today to include upgrades that will support Artemis II and Artemis III.


When SLS blasts off from Kennedy’s Launch Pad 39B, Orion isn’t the only thing it will be sending to space. Hitching a ride with Orion are tiny, shoe-box sized satellites – called CubeSats – that were loaded into the Orion stage adapter in Kennedy’s Space Station Processing Facility.

The extra room in the stage adapter provides a rare opportunity to send those CubeSats to deep space to conduct science and research of their own.

And, these CubeSats are on tap to study a range of topics – from the Moon, to asteroids, to the effect of space radiation on living organisms.

At this point, the stack is nearly complete – all that’s missing is the spacecraft itself, which has been in the Launch Abort System Facility getting outfitted with one of the spacecraft’s most crucial pieces.

The launch abort system is kind of that pointy solid rocket motor that’s at the top of Orion, and it’s there to protect the crew in the event of an emergency so it’s a very important system. Fully integrated with its launch abort system, the Orion spacecraft slowly makes its way to the VAB in the overnight hours.


Upon its arrival, teams carefully lift and lower it onto the Orion stage adapter. With this operation, stacking the most powerful rocket the world has ever seen is complete – and, what a sight to behold.

We’re trying to decide what does exploration look like in the future when we retire Shuttle? You know, what does our nation want to do? Where do we want to go? How do we want to explore?

To see it go from those days of words and ideas in people’s heads to the three programs we have today and the Artemis mission and all the hardware that’s been produced in factories ranging from, big aerospace companies to little mom and pop shops all over the country and the world, it’s unbelievable. I’m just really proud.

Before SLS and Orion can launch our nation into a new era of space exploration, a series of tests need to take place inside the VAB, validating the rocket and spacecraft as an integrated system and paving the way for one, final milestone: wet dress rehearsal.

The 322-foot-tall, fully integrated rocket will roll out to Launch Pad 39B for a full test, allowing the launch team to run through a full launch countdown but stopping just short of firing the engines.


I think we’re going to be so proud when it rolls out of the VAB. I will personally be probably crying a little bit because it’s such a big event. We worked so hard to get us to the day of rolling out. I’m probably going to be bawling when we launch it, see it through my tears, because it’s just a culmination of so much work from everybody.

We owe the advancement of science and research and technology to what we’re doing here. And, this is a big opportunity for us as a nation to reclaim our spot at the forefront of human space flight and exploration.

Artemis is going to be a major part of history. It most definitely is going to rock the space industry when it flies.

This program is going to go to the Moon. It’s going to go to Mars. We need that. This country needs that. This world needs that.

I’m so excited. It’s going to be a lot of work, a lot of work ahead of us, but Artemis I is going to surprise everybody.

As World Beard Day (September 3) comes around again, and the planet gets ready to celebrate fabulous facial hair, here are a few things that scientists have discovered about beards.

Beards are undeniably manly

Multiple studies^[1] have^[2] found^[3] that men look more masculine, dominant, aggressive, and strong when they wear a beard. Indeed, men also report feeling^[4] more masculine when they have facial hair.

Research has also shown that men who choose to be bearded^[5] tend to have higher testosterone levels than those who choose to be clean-shaven, and they are more likely to be hostile sexists,^[6] in other words, to favor the patriarchy and male dominance, and to think that women belong in the kitchen. These men may be using beards (and muscles) to reinforce gender roles.

Beards may be used to intimidate rivals

In his 1970s book, “Evolution of human threat display organs,” Professor R. D. Guthrie theorized that beards could be used to intimidate male rivals by increasing perceptions of the size of the jaw and enhancing aggressive and threatening jaw-thrusting behaviors. Additionally, research has revealed that people can recognize expressions of anger faster^[7] on a bearded face than on a clean-shaven face, but are slower to recognize expressions like happiness or sadness.

The knowledge that beards serve as a signal of formidability may help to explain why men like a beard on themselves, but not on other men.^[8] They need not worry. Although some researchers^[9] have suggested that beards evolved to protect a man’s face by absorbing and dispersing the force of any blows he might get on the chin, others^[10] have found that bearded men are no more likely to win a fight than their clean-shaven peers.

Beards add maturity (and employability)

Beards often make men look older, more mature,^[11] of higher social status,^[12] and more credible.^[13] This can be especially useful for job-seeking men who look young for their age.^[14] In fact, while past research^[15] has found that men with beards are less likely to be offered a job than their clean-shaven counterparts, times change, and more recent research^[16] shows that men with beards are perceived as having more expertise than clean-shaven men and, as such, are more likely to be invited to a job interview.


Beards are especially useful to those working in advice-giving roles. In 2020, assistant professor of marketing Dr. Sarah Mittal was inspired to look into^[17] beards by her husband, the boyish-faced co-owner of an IT company who didn’t think that his clients took him seriously without whiskers. In one experiment, she and her marketing colleague, David Silvera, asked 127 people to imagine that they were shopping for a tablet or laptop. Each person was shown a randomly selected image of a “salesman” with one of four types of facial hair — clean-shaven, a standard mustache, a handlebar mustache, or a full beard — and asked to rate the man’s expertise and trustworthiness. The bearded version was always rated the best: 11.6% higher for trustworthiness than the clean-shaven version, and 10.6% higher for expertise.

In another experiment, the researchers placed a Facebook ad for a real business and used a photo of either a bearded or a clean-shaven sales representative. The bearded representative produced a much higher click-through rate — 2.66% — than the clean-shaven version. Higher, indeed, than the industry averages of about 1.04% (technology) and 0.71% (industrial services). The study also revealed that customers view bearded salesmen as being more expert and trustworthy than their stubbled, mustached, or clean-shaven counterparts, regardless of the salesman’s age, race, ethnicity, attractiveness, or likability.

Beards may add sex appeal

Beards not only cover the signs of aging, but they also slow down the aging process in the skin by protecting the wearer from the sun.^[18] As well as protecting men from wrinkles, age spots, and shaving-induced acne, beards can hide the signs of disease^[19] and enhance the sex appeal of men with small, weak-looking jaws.^[20]


Like most of our optional accessories, facial hair goes in and out of fashion. Although beards may have been incredibly unpopular^[21] in the past, they are much more well-liked now. However, research on whether women find bearded men attractive is mixed. Some studies^[22] suggest^[11] that women find a face displaying the ability to grow facial hair more attractive than a face with a full beard, but that men with full beards are preferred for long-term relationships.^[23] Some research^[24] finds that women prefer men whose beardedness matches that of their fathers (and that homosexual men prefer men whose beardedness matches their own). In the end, what is appealing to one person is not to another.^[25]

Population trends in facial hair have been shown to increase when there are more single men than single women, suggesting that beards are being used to display masculinity^[26] to prospective mates. Some people^[28] also believe that the recent rise in beardedness may be due to the tough financial conditions: men seeking to attract mates in today’s harsh economy may be dialing their masculinity up to 11. However, research^[27] has also found that the more beards there are, the less attractive they become. The scientific term for this is “negative frequency-dependent sexual selection,” which, simply put, means that we tend to prefer mates who are rare or unique because they are thought to have a genetic advantage. In a society that has reached peak beard, one more man with facial hair is nothing to write home about.

Beards are not popular with young children

Although research has revealed that people think that men with full beards look trustworthy^[29] and good,^[30] and that women think that they would make better fathers^[22] than clean-shaven men, especially when they have children of their own,^[31] children as young as 21 months seem to think that men with beards look strong but very unattractive,^[32] and their dislike only grows stronger with age. However, around the age of puberty, their views changed and they start to like them more. Personal experience counts, too: children with bearded fathers generally judge facial hair more positively.



Still, to a child, a man with a beard is not to be trusted. Further research has shown that kids are more likely to pick a bearded man to help them with feats of strength, like fighting a dragon,^[33] but prefer a clean-shaven ally when they need someone reliable to help them hide a treasure map.

Beards are good for your health

A well-groomed beard can provide a man with several health benefits. For a start, beards can fight allergies.^[34] They also keep the wearer warm. So efficiently, in fact, that there is a theory^[35] that male pattern baldness has developed among humans in an attempt to compensate for the growth of a beard by promoting heat loss through the scalp.

That said, beards tend to have a bad rep when it comes to cleanliness. According to one small 2019 study,^[36] you can find more germs in a beard than in a dog’s fur. It pays to remember, however, that the vast majority of bacteria are not harmful, and quite a few are actually beneficial. In fact, research has found that beard bacteria could be developed into antibiotics,^[37] something that would actually be very handy since our current stock is rapidly becoming ineffective.


Additionally, research^[38] has also found that clean-shaven men are more than 10 percent more likely to be harboring colonies of Staphylococcus aureus — a bacterium that causes skin infections, respiratory infections, and food poisoning — on their faces than their whiskered counterparts, and more than three times as likely to be carrying MRSA around on their freshly shaven cheeks.

A recent survey^[39] of 919 women found that those who were repulsed by creatures like lice and fleas were less likely to find bearded men attractive. Interestingly, however, those who were worried about picking up harmful bacteria or viruses were more likely to find bearded men attractive. The researchers surmised that facial hair was either being used as a marker of health by those women or that it covered up the areas of the face that could communicate ill health.

According to U.S. psychologist Robert Pellegrini, “Inside every clean-shaven man, there is a beard screaming to be let out.”^[1] Those men who choose to listen to their inner beard can definitely look forward to a feeling of enhanced masculinity and fewer facial bacteria.

References:

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2. pms.sagepub.com/content/68/3/921.full.pdf
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