NASA plans to fuel the Artemis II Moon rocket on Monday, February 2, at Kennedy Space Centre in Florida

NASA has begun a two-day practice countdown for its first moonshot with astronauts in 53 years. The dress rehearsal that started Saturday night will culminate with the fueling of the space agency's new moon rocket.

A Mars spacecraft launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida, has been AWOL. But NASA hasn't given up hope of restoring contact with the MAVEN orbiter.

In the days ahead, NASA could roll out the SLS rocket that will propel four astronauts on a journey around the moon. Here's the latest on Artemis 2.

With the wet dress rehearsal, essentially a critical fueling test of the Artemis 2 Space Launch System moon rocket, now back on Feb. 2, NASA said in a statement that it can no longer target Feb. 6 or Feb. 7, the first two days of its launch window. The Artemis 2 launch window originally ran from Feb. 6 to Feb. 10.

Jan. 28, 1986, 7 spacefarers were killed when shuttle Challenger exploded midair after launching from Kennedy Space Center in Florida

NASA's space shuttle Challenger exploded and broke apart Jan. 28, 1986, in the sky over East-Central Florida, killing the seven astronauts on board.