Vice President Pence to visit Cape Canaveral on Wednesday

Vice President Mike Pence will travel to Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida on Wednesday, December 9. There, he will visit with space professionals of the 45th Space Wing.

The Vice President will then chair the Eighth Meeting of the National Space Council at the Kennedy Space Center. He is expected to deliver remarks on NASA’s Artemis program and the space accomplishments of the Trump Administration.

NASA has started assembling the Artemis Space Launch System, marking an important milestone ahead of future missions to the moon.

The aft segments of the Space Launch System solid rocket boosters for the Artemis I mission prepare to move from high bay 4 inside NASA's Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) at Kennedy Space Center in Florida for stacking on the mobile launcher inside hi

“At NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, engineers lowered the first of 10 segments into place Nov. 21 for the twin solid rocket boosters that will power the first flight of the agency’s new deep-space rocket,” NASA said in a statement. “Artemis I will be an uncrewed flight to test the SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft as an integrated system ahead of crewed flights to the Moon with the Artemis program.”

RELATED: NASA starts assembling Artemis Space Launch System rocket

The space agency said the booster segments arrived by train in June from Northrop Grumman’s manufacturing facility in Utah.

Illustration of Artemis astronauts on the Moon. (Credits: NASA)

“Stacking operations began Nov. 19 with engineers transporting a booster segment from the Rotation, Processing and Surge Facility to the 525-foot-tall Vehicle Assembly Building,” it said.

The Artemis I mission is scheduled to take place in 2021. 

NASA’s Artemis program aims to return astronauts to the moon in 2024. However, a recent report from the NASA Office of Inspector General described the 2024 timeline as overly ambitious.