NASA, SpaceX prepare for upcoming Falcon 9 rocket launch to International Space Station
NASA and SpaceX crews are preparing for the next mission to the International Space Station.
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SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft will be used to launch a resupply mission to the ISS next Thursday, Nov. 9.
The supplies will be sent to low-Earth orbit at 8:28 p.m. from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.
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The launch was previously planned for next Tuesday, but NASA’s Kennedy Space Center announced Friday that the launch has been delayed to Thursday.
This launch will be the 29th supply mission SpaceX will send to the ISS.
NASA officials said SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft will deliver new science investigations, food, supplies, and equipment to the international crew, including NASA’s AWE (Atmospheric Waves Experiment), which studies atmospheric gravity waves to understand the flow of energy through Earth’s upper atmosphere and space.
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“The spacecraft also will deliver NASA’s ILLUMA-T (Integrated Laser Communications Relay Demonstration Low-Earth-Orbit User Modem and Amplifier Terminal), which aims to test high data rate laser communications from the space station to Earth via the agency’s LCRD (Laser Communications Relay Demonstration). Together, ILLUMA-T and LCRD will complete NASA’s first two-way, end-to-end laser communications relay system,” NASA said.
The Dragon spacecraft is set to arrive at the ISS around 12 p.m. on Thursday.
The spacecraft is expected to spend about a month at the space station before returning to Earth off the coast of Florida.
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