How to Watch NASA’s Artemis 1 Launch

NASA is planning to launch Artemis 1 on the morning of Aug. 29 despite a series of strikes on the lightning protection system at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

The space agency says(Opens in a new window) “there were three lightning strikes to the lightning protection system towers at Launch Pad 39B – a strike to Tower 1, and two strikes to Tower 2,” on Aug. 27. But NASA will continue to prepare to launch Artemis 1 between 8:33 and 10:33am on Aug. 29.

“Overnight engineers evaluated data from lightning strikes to the lightning protection system at Launch Pad 39B that occurred yesterday,” NASA says(Opens in a new window). “They confirmed the strikes were of low magnitude and had no impacts to Space Launch System, Orion, or ground systems.”

The Orlando Sentinel reports(Opens in a new window) that more than 200,000 people are expected to visit “the Florida Space Coast” to watch the launch. Many more are likely to watch it virtually—the launch will be streamed on NASA TV(Opens in a new window), the NASA app(Opens in a new window), and NASA’s website(Opens in a new window) as well as Twitch(Opens in a new window) and YouTube.

NASA says it will also be providing full launch coverage for Artemis 1 on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and other social platforms.

“The first in an increasingly complex series of missions,” the space agency says, “Artemis I(Opens in a new window) will pave the way for long-term lunar exploration, providing the foundation for extending human presence to the Moon and beyond.” More information is available via NASA’s website(Opens in a new window).