Wicks Family Field at Joe Davis Stadium proudly houses the J-2X NASA Rocket Engine. This symbol of Huntsville's rich history in space exploration was unveiled at the final match of the inaugural Huntsville City FC season on September 24, 2023.
This is the only NASA rocket engine on long-term display at a professional sports venue in the world.
The engine’s namesake comes from its predecessor, the J-2 engine of the Apollo era, used on Saturn V rockets, which carried the first humans to the moon. The engine design leveraged 50 years of experience in human spaceflight with state-of-the-art technology in design processes, materials, and manufacturing to enable further human exploration of space. The development and testing of the J-2X helped usher in major manufacturing improvements, including 3-D printing of complex rocket engine components and the development of new materials.
The J-2X engine is a liquid-oxygen/liquid-hydrogen fueled rocket engine that produces nearly 300,000 pounds of thrust in a vacuum. It is a highly efficient and versatile advanced rocket engine built using the knowledge and successes of nearly a half-century of NASA spaceflight experience. The J-2X was designed and built by Pratt & Wheatley Rocketdyne of Canoga Park, Calif. for NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center at Redstone Arsenal in North Alabama.
