Astrobotic
Over the past two weeks, Astrobotic has begun sharing photos of its next Moon lander, Griffin, as it began assembly inside a cleanroom at Astrobotic's headquarters in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
While only two pics of components—Griffin's flight deck and two 'wings' attached to a central cone—have been revealed, this clearly indicates that Astrobotic is on track to fabricate the lander that NASA's VIPER Moon rover will be attached to when they launch aboard SpaceX's Falcon Heavy rocket in late 2024.
Meanwhile, Astrobotic's first lander, Peregrine, continues to share the same cleanroom as Griffin. The company is still waiting for United Launch Alliance (ULA) to give the greenlight to ship Peregrine to Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (CCSFS) in Florida so that it can finally be mated to ULA's Vulcan Centaur rocket.
While the Vulcan Centaur enjoyed a successful Flight Tanking Test last week, the rocket was rolled back to the Vertical Integration Facility at CCSFS' Space Launch Complex (SLC)-41 earlier today so that ULA can make some adjustments to testing procedures before the vehicle rolls back out to its pad at SLC-41 to undergo a Flight Readiness Firing of its two BE-4 main engines. This engine test is scheduled to take place later this week.
Stay tuned!
Astrobotic
Astrobotic
Good #VulcanRocket Flight Tanking Tests last Friday & Saturday. Will need to adjust a handful of parameters and set points for a reliable FRF count. (Which is is the purpose of this run). Rolling back to the VIF today to work on that. FRF in a few days or so.
— Tory Bruno (@torybruno) May 15, 2023
And Vulcan is heading back to the barn, as planned. Will rollout back to SLC-41 later this week for the FRF.https://t.co/tANS0dWyIH https://t.co/FOsphIOeGL pic.twitter.com/XiFDVYadQP
— Chris Bergin - NSF (@NASASpaceflight) May 15, 2023
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