On the evening of November 14th, SpaceX plans to re-create the monumental feat it achieved earlier this year by launching another crew of astronauts to the International Space Station. This mission is a milestone for both SpaceX and NASA. It is the first “operational” crewed flight for the company and a step toward making American astronaut launches relatively routine.
The flight, called Crew-1, will send a total of four astronauts to the International Space Station on SpaceX’s new Crew Dragon spacecraft, a capsule designed to launch on top of the company’s Falcon 9 rocket. Three of the passengers are NASA astronauts — Michael Hopkins, Victor Glover, and Shannon Walker — and a fourth is an astronaut with the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency, named Soichi Noguchi. The quartet will join three additional crew members already on the ISS, staying for up to six months before they leave in the spring of 2021.
THE FIRST “OPERATIONAL” CREWED FLIGHT FOR THE COMPANY
That’s double the number of riders that the Crew Dragon had in May when the spacecraft carried two NASA astronauts — Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley — on the vehicle’s debut crewed flight. While lots of fanfare surrounded that mission, SpaceX is now about to settle into a more or less regular flight pattern with the Crew Dragon, sending groups of four astronauts to and from the International Space Station every six months or so for NASA. It’s exactly why the Crew Dragon was developed for NASA’s Commercial Crew Program: to serve as a private space taxi for NASA’s astronauts to get to and from the ISS.
Here’s what you need to know about the lead-up to this mission, what to expect during SpaceX’s first operational flight of Crew Dragon and how things will play out in the years ahead.
BACKGROUND
Crew-1 comes more than five months after SpaceX’s history-making flight on May 31st that carried Behnken and Hurley to the space station. The mission marked the first time a private company had flown humans to orbit. It was also the first time that astronauts had launched to orbit from American soil since the end of the Space Shuttle program in 2011. For nearly a decade, NASA astronauts have had to rely on Russian rockets to get to the space station, launching out of Kazakhstan. When SpaceX’s Crew Dragon took off from Cape Canaveral, Florida, with Behnken and Hurley in tow, it effectively ended the gap in US human spaceflight.
SPACEX NEEDED TO MAKE A FEW TWEAKS TO THE CREW DRAGON
The final change SpaceX and NASA made revolves around the procedure, not vehicle design. When the Crew Dragon splashed down off the coast of Pensacola in August, the vehicle was met by a swarm of recreational boaters who were curious to see a spacecraft up close. The sight of boats zooming in and around the capsule sparked immediate concern — for both the astronauts on board as well as the boaters themselves. The Crew Dragon uses propellants and fuel that can be toxic to humans if they get too close and aren’t taking proper precautions.
To prevent a repeat scene, SpaceX and NASA say they have worked with the US Coast Guard to create a 10-mile keep-out zone around the landed Crew Dragon so that no unauthorized visitors approach the vehicle in the water. “We want to have more boats on the next to go around and make sure that the area is really clear of any other [civilian] boats,” Koenigsmann said.
It’s a quick trip to orbit for Crew Dragon — just 12 minutes after takeoff. The crew will then spend around eight and a half hours in orbit, arriving at the International Space Station and docking around 4:20 AM ET. It’s a much brisker trip than Behnken and Hurley’s mission, which took about 19 hours to get to the ISS.
Designed to autonomously dock with the space station, the Crew Dragon will slowly approach its destination in space and use a series of sensors and cameras to place itself on an open docking port. Once it connects, latches will secure the Crew Dragon in place, and the Crew-1’s six-month stay on board the ISS will begin.
THE FOUR-PERSON TEAM WILL JOIN THREE PEOPLE ALREADY LIVING ON THE ISS
The four-person team will join three people already living on the ISS: Russian cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Sergey Kud-Sverchkov and NASA astronaut Kate Rubins. It’ll be the first time that seven people will live and work together on the ISS, as crews have typically topped out at six people over the last 10 years. While the space station has more than enough room for the extra crew member, the vehicle is actually short one “crew quarters” or a place for an astronaut to sleep. Astronaut Michael Hopkins said NASA is hoping to send up another place for him to sleep while they’re onboard the ISS, but in the meantime, he will probably sleep onboard Crew Dragon.
KEEPING TIME
With any launch, there is always the risk of delay. In fact, this mission was supposed to take place on October 31st, but NASA pushed back the flight to this weekend after SpaceX found some irregular behavior in the main engines of its Falcon 9 rocket. The company had to swap out two engines on the Falcon 9 being used for this flight to address the issue.
Moving forward, the biggest threat to a timely launch could be the weather. This week, all eyes were on Tropical Storm Eta, currently crossing through Florida. The storm now seems to be heading north of the launch site and should clear the state on Thursday.
Photo by Joel Kowsky / NASA
Still, the weather is always a lingering concern, especially with these passenger flights to the station. SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule has the ability to abort during flight, by detaching itself from the rocket and parachuting into the ocean to save the crew members if something goes wrong. That means flight controllers will be keeping an eye on the weather throughout a large swath of the Atlantic Ocean to make sure if an abort does happen, the Crew Dragon doesn’t splashdown in choppy seas.
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