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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Two NASA astronauts preparing to travel in SpaceX’s new space taxi will now be on a mission planned to last more than a month, rather than a week, to assist the crew aboard the International Space Station, EE. USA space agency said on Friday.
The launch is scheduled for May 27 from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida and will hit the ISS the next day. The mission, the first to be carried by SpaceX humans, marks the company’s culminating test before NASA can certify its Crew Dragon capsule for regular operational flights.
Space shuttle veterans Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley will be the first astronauts launched from US soil since the shuttle program ended in 2011.
The mission’s extension allows Hurley and Behnken to help change the station’s batteries, a task that requires an outer spacewalk that current ISS resident Chris Cassidy could not do alone.
The two astronauts embraced the mission’s extension, with Hurley saying it could take anywhere from one to four months.
“I think being in the summer, hopefully with a release date of May 27, we are coming to a good time for my son to be able to follow the mission a little more closely than he would if he were in school.” . Behnken said.
SpaceX and Boeing Co
“We are currently supporting the station with the bare minimum,” NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said Friday. “Without the presence of Behnken and Hurley, otherwise we would probably postpone such an operation until additional NASA crew members are available.”
Kirk Shireman, manager of NASA’s ISS program, told reporters on Friday that the agency is basing the duration of Hurley and Behnken’s mission on how quickly SpaceX can finish preparations on its next capsule.
Delays in the development of SpaceX and Boeing vehicles have led NASA to extend its dependence on Russia, forcing the space agency to buy additional seats on the Soyuz rocket to transport more astronauts into space.
(Report by Joey Roulette; edition by Bill Tarrant and Rosalba O’Brien)
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