Boeing's 1st core stage for NASA's Space Launch System arrives at Kennedy Space Center

SAN FRANCISCO, April 29 (Xinhua) -- A Boeing-built rocket core stage for NASA's Space Launch System (SLS) was unloaded from a barge on Thursday at the agency's Kennedy Space Center and moved to the Vehicle Assembly Building, the company said in an announcement.

The 212-foot (65-meter) core stage will be stacked with a Boeing/United Launch Alliance Interim Cryogenic Upper Stage, two solid rocket boosters, a Launch Vehicle Stage Adapter and the Orion spacecraft, according to the announcement.

Teams will prepare the SLS to launch Orion on an uncrewed mission around the moon and back called Artemis I.

The first in a series of increasingly complex missions, Artemis I will test the Orion spacecraft and SLS rocket as an integrated system ahead of crewed flights to the moon for sustained exploration. SLS is the only rocket that can send Orion, astronauts and cargo to the moon in a single mission, the announcement said.