LIVE: Watch NASA and SpaceX Launch Four Astronauts Into Space
Tonight, NASA and SpaceX are scheduled to launch the first ever "operational" Crew Dragon mission from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
NASA astronauts Victor Glover, Shannon Walker, and Mike Hopkins, as well as JAXA astronaut Soichi Noguchi, will join the International Space Station's current inhabitants.
NASA and SpaceX analyzed data from the Demo-2 mission, which launched NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley earlier this year.
Just after sundown tonight, NASA and Japan's space agency, JAXA, will send four astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS) aboard SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon capsule. If all goes according to plan, Falcon 9 will roar to life at 7:27 p.m. EST and lift off from Launch Complex 39a at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
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The astronauts will suit up and leave for the launch pad around 4:00 p.m. EST. You can watch the livestream right here:
The mission has been delayed a number of times, first when engineers discovered an issue with the lacquer on one of SpaceX's Merlin engines (both NASA and SpaceX say they have identified the issue and are confident in the mission's success). The mission was delayed again this week due to poor weather conditions at the Cape.
According to a NASA update this morning, conditions for launch are 50 percent favorable. If the weather turns and conditions at the pad (or down-range off the Atlantic coast) sour, NASA and SpaceX are targeting Wednesday, November 18, as a backup date.
Who's On Board?
NASA's Mike Hopkins, Shannon Walkerm and Victor Glover—as well as JAXA's Soichi Noguchi—will strap into their metal steed this evening and, pending good weather, set off for the ISS.
Together, the astronauts of Crew-1 have a wealth of experience. Hopkins, the mission commander, joined the astronaut corps in 2009 and has spent a total of 166 days in orbit. Walker joined the astronaut corps in 2004 and spent 163 days in orbit during 2010's Expedition 24/25.
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Noguchi, meanwhile, has extensive experience in microgravity. He has flown on two missions: the STS-114 space shuttle mission in 2004 and Expedition 22/23, during which he spent 163 days in space. And Glover, who joined NASA's astronaut corps in 2013, will become the first black astronaut to live and work aboard the ISS for an extended period of time. This is his first mission to space.
It'll be a full house when the crew arrives: NASA's Kate Rubins and Russian cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Sergey Kud-Sverchkov are already aboard the ISS. Crew-1 is currently scheduled to stay for six months before they make the journey back home.
Riding the Wave of Demo-2 Success
The Crew-1 mission comes on the heels of May's historic Demo-2 mission, during which NASA and SpaceX launched astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley to the ISS aboard a reusable, commercial spacecraft for the first time. It also marked the return of crewed spaceflight to American soil for the first time in 11 years.
After Behnken and Hurley splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico in August, the real work began. Together, NASA and SpaceX pored over the data to get a better sense of how the mission went and identify which areas need improvement for Crew-1.
There were two key concerns, according to SpaceX's Hans Koenigsmann, who spoke at a press conference earlier this year. First, the company bolstered a section of the capsule's heat shield, which suffered more intense abrasion upon reentry than expected. Next, SpaceX fixed an issue with one of the sensors designed to measure altitude and release the capsule's parachutes. This lengthy process cleared the way for Crew Dragon to be certified for launch.
Tonight's launch is considered the first "operational" flight for SpaceX's Crew Dragon capsule. The launch, however, will mark the 21st flight for Falcon 9 this year. (SpaceX celebrated its 100th successful launch on October 24.)
Another Mission on the Horizon
For the past 10 years, NASA has paid more than $80 million per seat for a ride aboard Russia's Soyuz spacecraft. But through the Commercial Crew Program, which was developed during the Obama administration, the agency contracted SpaceX and Boeing to develop an alternate means of transportation to the ISS.
NASA awarded SpaceX $3.1 billion to develop Crew Dragon and Falcon 9 and $4.8 billion to Boeing for its Starliner spacecraft. (Boeing hopes to conduct another test flight of its maligned spacecraft in January 2021.) In total, CNBC reports, SpaceX has been tapped to launch six operational missions to the ISS, with tonight's Crew-1 being the first.
The next mission, NASA's Crew-2, is currently scheduled for sometime in spring 2021. The crew will ride to the ISS aboard the same Endeavor Crew Dragon capsule that Behnken and Hurley tested this summer.
In July, NASA announced that astronauts Shane Kimbrough and Megan McArthur (Benhken's wife), European Space Agency astronaut Thomas Pesquet, and JAXA astronaut Akihiko Hoshide had been tapped to crew the mission.
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