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CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla.— Elon Musk’s rocket company SpaceX launched four astronauts on a flight to the International Space Station on Sunday, POTThe first full-blown mission to send a crew into orbit aboard a privately owned spacecraft.
SpaceX’s newly designed Crew Dragon capsule, which the crew has dubbed Resilience, lifted off on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket at 7:27 p.m. ET (0027 GMT Monday) from POTKennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida.
“It was an incredible ride,” said astronaut Mike Hopkins from Crew Dragon to SpaceX mission control about an hour after liftoff. “There were many smiles.”
Crew Dragon will gradually raise its orbit over the next 27 hours through a series of onboard thruster shots, giving the astronauts time to eat packed dinners and approximately eight hours to rest before docking at the International Space Station at 11 p.m. Eastern time on Monday. .
An air leak caused an unexpected drop in capsule pressure less than two hours before launch, POT officials said. But technicians said they ran a successful leak check and the scheduled launch was still underway.
The Resilience team includes Hopkins and two companions POT astronauts, mission pilot Victor Glover and physicist Shannon Walker. They were joined by Japanese astronaut Soichi Noguchi, who made his third trip to space after previously flying the American shuttle in 2005 and Soyuz in 2009.
The 27-hour journey to the space station, a laboratory orbiting about 250 miles (400 km) above Earth, was originally scheduled to begin Saturday. But the launch was postponed for a day due to forecasts of wind gusts, remnants of Tropical Storm Eta, which would have made it difficult to land back for the Falcon 9’s reusable booster stage. POT officials said.
The astronauts donned their custom white flight suits and arrived at the Kennedy Space Center launch pad as scheduled at 4:30 p.m. in three white Tesla SUVs, flanked by POT and SpaceX staff.
SpaceX mission operator Jay Aranha, speaking from company headquarters in Hawthorne, California, told the crew to “have an incredible journey and know that we are all for one.”
Mission Commander Mike Hopkins responded by saying “to all the people in POT and SpaceX, working together in these difficult times, have inspired the nation of the world. “
“And now is the time for us to do our part, Crew 1 for everyone,” Hopkins said.
Vice President Mike Pence attended the launch and said ahead of time that under President Donald Trump, the United States had “renewed our commitment to lead human space exploration.”
President-elect Joe Biden tweeted his congratulations and said the launch was “a testament to the power of science.”
First private mission
POT is calling the flight its first “operational” mission for a 10-year crew vehicle and rocket system. Represents a new era of commercially developed spacecraft owned and operated by a private entity rather than POT – for sending Americans into orbit.
A test flight of the SpaceX Crew Dragon in August, carrying only two astronauts to and from the space station, marked POTThe first human space mission launched from US soil in nine years, following the end of the space shuttle program in 2011. In the intervening years, US astronauts have had to hitchhike into orbit aboard the Russian Soyuz spacecraft.
POT hired SpaceX and Boeing in 2014 to develop competing space capsules intended to replace its shuttle program and divert the United States from reliance on Russian rockets to send astronauts into space.
SpaceX’s launch on Sunday was the first of six operational missions for POT. The company has also booked private astronaut missions, including one that will take on actor Tom Cruise for years to come.
Musk, the billionaire SpaceX CEO who is also CEO of battery and electric car maker Tesla Inc, did not see lift off from the Kennedy Space Center launch control room POT officials said. Musk said Saturday that he “most likely” has a moderate case of COVID-19.
SpaceX and POT they have conducted contact tracing and determined that Musk had not come into contact with anyone who interacted with the astronauts.
“Our astronauts have been in quarantine for weeks and shouldn’t have had contact with anyone.” POT Chief Jim Bridenstine said Friday. “They must be in good shape.”
—Report of Andrea Shalal in Cape Canaveral and Joey Roulette in Washington; Additional information from Brad Brooks in Lubbock, Texas; Edited by Daniel Wallis, Leslie Adler, Chris Reese, and Simon Cameron-Moore
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