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NASA is ready for the first operational launch of SpaceX Crew Dragon, marking a milestone for the space program.
The launch, which was postponed from Saturday due to weather, is scheduled for 7:27 p.m. ET Sunday from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The six-month mission is the first rotational crew flight on an American commercial spacecraft.
The latest weather forecast is 50% favorable, NASA tweeted on Sunday morning.
“All systems are ready for launch tonight at 7:27 pm EST of Crew Dragon’s first operational mission with four astronauts on board,” SpaceX tweeted.
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The Crew-1 mission will bring NASA astronauts Mike Hopkins, Victor Glover and Shannon Walker and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Soichi Noguchi to the International Space Station aboard the Crew Dragon vehicle. It follows a successful Demo-2 mission earlier this year.
NASA firefighters drive down the road outside the fence near a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, with the company’s Crew Dragon capsule attached, sits on the launch pad at Launch Complex 39A on Friday the 13th November 2020, at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida
(AP Photo / Chris O’Meara)
Vice President Mike Pence and Second Lady Karen Pence will attend the launch of Crew-1.
The launch was originally scheduled for October 31, but was postponed to November 14 when the Falcon rocket had two engines replaced due to contamination from a red lacquer used in processing.
The astronauts named their capsule Dragon Resilience in the face of all the challenges of 2020: coronavirus and social isolation, protests against racial injustice, and a particularly difficult electoral and electoral season. They have been in quarantine for a week or two and were taking security measures – masks and social distancing – long before that.
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On the orbiting space lab, Team Crew-1 will join NASA astronaut Kate Rubins, who is already on the space station, to conduct extensive scientific research. “Not only will Crew 1 astronauts and NASA Expedition 64 astronaut Kate Rubins conduct hundreds of microgravity studies during their mission, but they will also provide new scientific equipment and experiments carried into space with them inside Crew Dragon, ”NASA said in a statement.
NASA astronauts, left, Shannon Walker, Victor Glover, Mike Hopkins and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) astronaut Soichi Noguchi, right, dressed in SpaceX space suits, stop to pose for a photo exiting the Neil A. Armstrong Operations and Checkout The building will depart for Launch Complex 39A during a dress rehearsal Thursday, November 12, 2020 at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla.
(Joel Kowsky / NASA via AP)
Astronauts will study the physiology of food, conduct a student-designed experiment on genes in space and grow radishes, and examine the interaction between microbes and rocks in microgravity.
Other experiments include the use of devices the size of a USB stick containing human cells to study the effects of space on human organs and a study of changes in cardiovascular cells and tissues in microgravity. Experiments will also be conducted on NASA’s next-generation space suit, the Exploration Extravehicular Mobility Unit (xEMU).
The mission marks another milestone for the U.S. space program after the Demo-2 flight earlier this year.
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On August 2, NASA astronauts Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken splashed in the Gulf of Mexico in a SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft, ending their historic two-month trip to space.
Astronaut Soichi Noguchi of Japan, left to right, NASA astronauts Shannon Walker, Victor Glover and Michael Hopkins walk after arriving at the Kennedy Space Center on Sunday, November 8, 2020, in Cape Canaveral, Florida.
(AP Photo / Terry Renna)
The mission marked the first astronaut launch from US soil since the space shuttle’s last flight in 2011. Amid a surge of publicity, the Demo-2 mission took off from the Kennedy Space Center atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket on May 30.
After the space shuttle program ended, the United States relied on Russian Soyuz rockets launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan to bring astronauts into space. Russia charges the United States about $ 75 million to send an astronaut into space, and the Associated Press reports that the latest Soyuz ticket cost the United States $ 90 million.
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Chris Ciaccia, Kristin Fisher, Lauren Blanchard, David Clark, Erin McEwan and Associated Press of Fox News contributed to this article.
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