Nasa's mega rocket has been moved to the launch pad in Cape Canaveral, Florida, as the final preparations get underway for the first crewed mission to the Moon in more than 50 years. Over almost 12 hours, the 98m-tall Space Launch System was carried vertically from the Vehicle Assembly Building on the 4-mile (6.5km) journey to the pad.

NASA's Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, built to support the agency's Artemis 2 mission and usher in a new era of crewed flights to the moon, headed out from the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) here at Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida this morning (Jan. 17), beginning a 4-mile (6.4 kilometers) trek to Launch Complex-39B (LC-39B).

NASA’s Space Launch System is the most powerful rocket the agency has ever built. It’s also one of the most expensive. According to NASA’s own watchdog, a single launch of the SLS and Orion spacecraft costs over $4 billion — a price described as “unsustainable.

NASA also announced that the next crewed mission, Crew-12, which for now is targeting a Feb. 15 launch, will be from SLC-40. Normally SpaceX uses Kennedy Space Center’s Launch Pad 39-A for its Crew Dragon flights, but did use SLC-40 once for Crew-9 in 2024. All four of SpaceX’s 2025 human spaceflights were from KSC.

Aside from Pandora, the launch also carried dozens of additional satellites, including two NASA-sponsored CubeSats.

Florida's Space Coast just hosted a record-shattering 109 orbital rocket launches during 2025, soaring beyond all previous annual records. Will this year's final total surpass that lofty sum from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station and NASA's Kennedy Space Center?