NASA conducts RS‑25 engine test supporting future Artemis missions

NASA Fires RS-25 Engine 10001 for Artemis

NASA fired its 10,001st RS‑25 engine for a full eight‑and‑a‑half minutes on Oct. 21. The test ran on the Fred Haise stand at Stennis. It pushed the nozzle to 111 percent power, the level new production engines need. Those engines will lift the SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft. While engine 10001 won’t fly, the hot‑fire gave NASA and L3Harris critical data on the new thermal‑protection system. That system shields the nozzle from the extreme heat of launch, a key step toward certifying flight components for Artemis. Four RS‑25s together generate up to two million pounds of thrust for each Artemis launch. Every engine still must pass Stennis testing before flight. The 500‑second burn matches the exact firing time an SLS engine experiences during launch.