Two Northrop Grumman five-segment solid rocket boosters will launch the first crewed flight of NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket from Pad 39B at Kennedy Space Center, Florida, as early as February 6, 2026, as part of the Artemis II mission.

The SLS boosters are the world’s largest and most powerful solid rocket boosters to ever be flown on a human spaceflight mission, standing 177 feet tall and producing 3.6 million pounds of thrust each. Evolved from the four-segment shuttle-era design, the boosters contributed over 75 percent of the SLS rocket’s thrust and performed as twins during Artemis I, the successful first launch of the rocket and uncrewed Orion spacecraft.

Northrop Grumman also manufactures the attitude control motor and abort motor for the Launch Abort System, the requisite safety system that is designed to lift the Orion spacecraft with its crew away if an emergency were to occur during launch or ascent, which will be active for this first crewed launch.

Expert:

Jim Kalberer, vice president, propulsion systems, Northrop Grumman: "We’ve leveraged our unparalleled manufacturing and solid rocket motor expertise to supply the SLS rocket with 7.2 million pounds of its 8.8 million pounds of total thrust at launch. The power and performance the Northrop Grumman-manufactured solid rocket boosters provide the SLS rocket is critical to America’s new age of exploration and building a sustainable human presence in deep space ahead of missions to Mars."

Details:

Artemis II is the first mission to take humans to deep space in more than 50 years. The four astronauts will perform an approximately 10-day mission around the Moon to confirm systems and hardware and build the foundation for lunar exploration and crewed missions to Mars.

Northrop Grumman will continue supporting the Artemis missions from the launch pad to deep space for years to come. The company is building the Habitat and Logistics Outpost (HALO) module of the Gateway, an unprecedented deep-space human habitat that will enable astronaut crews to safely live and work on long-duration missions to the Moon, Mars and beyond. In addition, Northrop Grumman is developing the next-generation solid rocket booster, the largest and most powerful segmented solid rocket booster ever manufactured, to enable future deep space exploration missions.

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