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Cocoa Beach (United States) (AFP) – Space lovers gather in Florida hoping to attend the launch of NASA’s new rocket to the Moon, scheduled for 2:17 p.m. local time on Saturday as part of the Artemis 1 mission of the SLS rocket, the most powerful of the world.
The Kennedy Space Center, where the rocket is due to take off, will be closed to the public, but viewers will be able to watch it rise from nearby beaches.
“I remember some moon landings when I was very young,” during the Apollo program, Alberto Tirado said Friday, consulted by the AFP agency in Cocoa Beach.
The launch, initially scheduled for Monday, was canceled at the last minute due to technical problems. The authorities had anticipated then some 100,000 or 200,000 spectators.
The number of tourists who traveled is yet to be confirmed, but could “double” this weekend, said Don Walker, Brevard County official.
“We estimate that viewers for the launch will be between 200,000 and 400,000 people,” he said.
SpaceX’s first manned launch in 2020 attracted some 220,000 people, in the midst of a pandemic.
The fact that the launch takes place over a long weekend due to the Labor Day holiday on Monday, as well as its historical character, contributes to the expected success of attendance, explained Meagan Happel, of the tourism office of the coast. Florida Space.
Attendees were asked to travel early to avoid traffic jams as nearby hotels have been booked for weeks and available parking spaces will be scarce.
The Artemis 1 mission is an unmanned test flight. The rocket-powered Orion capsule will spend a few weeks in space, venturing as far as 40,000 miles behind the Moon, farther than any habitable spacecraft has done so far.
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