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Nasa is committed to the safety and future of human spaceflight.

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With one final test, NASA’s Space Launch System rocket structural design is officially ready for flight.

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Engineers pushed the liquid oxygen tank structural test article to its limits in June 2020.

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The final test concludes a three year structural test campaign for the deep space rocket.

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Teams conducted 199 test cases and collected more than 420 gigabytes of data.

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The SLS rocket will power NASA’s Artemis missions to send astronauts to the Moon.

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NASA teams use exact replicas of the flight hardware, called structural test articles.

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The structural test articles are installed in test stands

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at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.

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Hydraulic systems push and pull on the hardware

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to simulate what the rocket will experience during launch and flight.

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Most structural testing includes baseline testing.

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But, NASA engineers also want to verify exactly how strong the SLS rocket hardware is.

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That kind of testing pushes the hardware until it fails.

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Because engineers apply forces much stronger

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than what they expect the hardware to endure…

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Sometimes the hardware pops and twists like a soda can.