Lunar mission with ‘Star Trek’ creator’s ashes is postponed – 12/14/2023 – Science

The inaugural launch of a new American rocket, the Vulcan Centaur, has been postponed until January 8. Initially, the flight intended to reach the Moon was scheduled to take place on Christmas Eve, but, according to the ULA group (United Launch Alliance), it was necessary to change the date due to setbacks.

The announcement was made by the general director of ULA, Tory Bruno, this Thursday (14), on X, formerly Twitter. But he highlighted that a general rehearsal carried out in recent days at the field of operations had good results.

Named Cert-1, the lunar mission will take off from Cape Canaveral, Florida, United States. The rocket will carry a landing module from the American startup Astrobotic and the ashes of dozens of people, including those of Gene Roddenberry, creator of “Sart Trek”, and the series’ actresses Majel Roddenberry and Nichelle Nichols.

If the mission is successful, ULA could become the first private company to land and the first American spacecraft to accomplish the feat since the end of the Apollo program.

“This is in a way the first giant step in the campaign of the United States and all our allies to return to the Moon, ultimately, with humans,” Bruno told AFP during an interview last week.

According to him, for this first flight, “it’s already bold to have a payload, especially one that goes to the Moon. But we wanted to do something big and we obviously have a lot of confidence in our rocket project.”

At X, Bruno indicated that, during the first test, some “routine” problems with ground systems arose.

The delays caused the December launch window to be missed and, therefore, the next one was opened for January 8th.