NASA will launch two crewed missions in early February, sending astronauts to the ISS to prepare for Mars missions and another crew to orbit the moon.

With the wet dress rehearsal, essentially a critical fueling test of the Artemis 2 Space Launch System moon rocket, now back on Feb. 2, NASA said in a statement that it can no longer target Feb. 6 or Feb. 7, the first two days of its launch window. The Artemis 2 launch window originally ran from Feb. 6 to Feb. 10.

Depending on the timing, NASA could launch a fresh crew to the space station while four other astronauts are flying around the moon.

NASA still plans to conduct plenty of tests involving the suit, including parabolic flight, which can simulate the partial gravity of the Moon’s surface. The agency has already put the suit through its paces underwater at NASA’s Neutral Buoyancy Lab.

NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and Orion spacecraft reached the Launch Pad 39B at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Saturday following a 4-mile, 12-hour crawl from the Vehicle Assembly Building.

NASA isn’t building the Lunar Gateway just for science — it’s a strategic move to lock in long-term control of deep space travel. Gateway would act like a staging point around the Moon, making missions safer,