NASA to Roll Out Artemis 2 Moon Rocket by Jan. 16

NASA is preparing to roll the Artemis 2 Moon rocket to Kennedy Space Center’s Pad 39B by mid-January—reported as no later than Jan. 16—after a key “countdown demonstration test” rehearsal with the flight crew, as the agency pushes toward an early-2026 lunar flyby mission.​

What’s happening at Kennedy

NASA’s Artemis II stack—Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and Orion spacecraft—is in the final stretch of processing inside the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, with rollout preparations tied to the completion of major integrated tests.​
One of the latest milestones was a crewed launch-day rehearsal known as the Countdown Demonstration Test (CDDT), where the astronauts practiced launch-day steps with teams and hardware involved in the real campaign.​

The rollout timeline remains dependent on smooth completion of the remaining integrated work, but current reporting points to a target of mid-January, described as no later than Jan. 16, to enable pad operations and final pre-launch testing.​

Why the rollout matters now

Moving the Artemis 2 Moon rocket to Pad 39B is a major transition from assembly and indoor testing to pad-based checkouts that can only be completed at the launch site, including rehearsals that use real propellants and a full countdown flow.​
Artemis II is NASA’s first crewed mission of the Artemis campaign and is designed to validate “foundational” deep-space human exploration systems—SLS, Orion, and ground systems—in a mission that sends astronauts around the Moon and back.​

NASA’s official public schedule lists Artemis II for no later than April 2026, underscoring that early-2026 processing milestones (like the mid-January rollout target) are tightly connected to the launch window planning.​

The two developments—combined

Astronauts just rehearsed launch day

During the CDDT event, the Artemis II crew traveled to the VAB and boarded Orion for a full-up launch-day practice with teams, stopping the simulated countdown at approximately T–29 seconds.​
This rehearsal is meant to validate procedures and timing across the crew, ground teams, and integrated vehicle systems before the operation shifts to the pad environment.​

The CDDT flow also includes demonstrations tied to emergency response processes, with follow-on work planned after rollout to review and rehearse pad egress operations before the launch escape system is armed.​

Rollout to the pad is the next big gate

After the remaining closeouts and testing in the VAB—including items such as a Flight Termination System test and vehicle compartment closeouts—the fully stacked rocket is expected to make the roughly four-mile trip to Launch Complex 39B.​
Reporting around the current pad flow expectation places the rollout by mid-January, cited as no later than Jan. 16, followed by an intense sequence of pad checkouts.​

Once at the pad, teams plan to move into the next phase of integrated testing and launch rehearsal activities that set the conditions for a real launch attempt later in the window.​

Artemis II mission facts readers ask about

Artemis II is a roughly 10-day crewed mission that will send four astronauts around the Moon and return to Earth, serving as the first crewed flight test of Orion and SLS together.​
NASA has emphasized that the mission is about proving out systems and operations needed for sustained lunar exploration, rather than landing on the Moon during this flight.​

The four-person Artemis II crew is Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch, and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen.​

Key Artemis II details (quick table)

What testing comes next—and how it supports launch readiness

After rollout, NASA’s teams plan additional pad-based activities that build toward a “wet dress rehearsal,” which is a full practice countdown that includes loading the rocket with cryogenic propellants.​
For SLS, that propellant operation is substantial—more than 730,000 gallons of liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen are expected to be loaded during the wet dress rehearsal flow.​

Pad time is also used for communications checks, safety system validations, and procedures that cannot be fully verified indoors, including astronaut familiarity steps tied to pad emergency egress equipment.​
NASA’s publicly stated Artemis II schedule (no later than April 2026) means these pad operations are not optional “nice-to-haves”—they are the final readiness gates before a launch attempt can be approved.​

Artemis II near-term timeline (based on current public signals)

Final thoughts

The next major public-facing milestone is the Artemis 2 Moon rocket rollout itself, because it marks the shift from assembly and rehearsals to pad operations that directly set up the launch attempt.​
After rollout, the wet dress rehearsal and final integrated pad checkouts will be key indicators of schedule health, since they test the same countdown and fueling steps needed on launch day.​

NASA’s current official schedule still states Artemis II will launch no later than April 2026, so the pace of January and February ground milestones will shape how much flexibility remains in the window.​