A-3 Test Stand Reaches New Heights
July 2, 2009
Steel is rising from the foundation of the new A-3 Test Stand under construction at NASA's John C. Stennis Space Center in south Mississippi. Workers with Lafayette Steel Erector Inc. are expected to erect more than 4 million pounds of fabricated steel at the site by April 2009. The new A-3 Test Stand will be able to simulate altitudes of up to 100,000 feet and will be used to test the J-2X rocket engine currently being developed by Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne. The J-2X engine will be used to help power the new Ares I and Ares V rockets, centerpieces of NASA's Constellation Program that will send humans back to the moon and possibly beyond. The A-3 stand is the first large test stand to be built at Stennis since the 1960s.
Topics:
Space, Space exploration, Space technology, Constellation program, John C. Stennis Space Center, Ares I, Shuttle-Derived Launch Vehicle, Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne, J-2, Rocket engines, Human spaceflight, Project Constellation, John C. Stennis
