US space agency NASA is building the world’s largest and most powerful rocket at its Michoud Assembly Facility, US. The rocket’s 212-foot-long core will carry around 2.3 million pounds of liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen to fuel the engines. It is being prepared for moon missions in 2018, and other Mars and deep space explorations in the 2030s.

To power a Mars rocket, the core stage carries around 2.3 million pounds of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen to fuel the four RS-25 engines. Engineers just completed welding the largest part of the core stage, the 130-foot-tall liquid hydrogen tank that will provide fuel for the first SLS flight in 2018, but there’s still work to ready the tank for its maiden voyage.

Building the core stage is similar to building a house,” said Joan Funk, SLS core stage lead at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. “With the massive, welded elements coming off the Vertical Assembly Center at Michoud, we’ve laid the foundation, framed the walls and put up the roof. The big items are in place. Now it’s time to get to work on the inside.” That’s where engineers will clean and prime each element before beginning the internal integration.