After much ado, the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket took off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Thursday. It carried two NASA astronauts a Russian cosmonaut and another from UAE.
The launch of the Crew-6 mission of SpaceX happened at 12:34 am (0534 GMT) from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. It was carried out from Kennedy Space Center’s Launch Complex 39A.
The launch was scrubbed on Monday due to a technical issue. The issue was caused by a clog in a filter that feeds the rocket’s ignition fluid.
The SpaceX Dragon spacecraft departed on Thursday, carrying the two astronauts. The US space agency noted that the flight would provide the public with “lightning up the skies”.
The SpaceX Dragon Endeavour, which is the crew capsule of the SpaceX Dragon, is set to dock with the International Space Station at 1:17 am on Friday.
The crew members of the mission, which is composed of Stephen Bowen and Warren Hoburg of NASA and Andrey Fedyaev of Russia, Sultan al-Neyadi of the United Arab Emirates, will spend six months living on the International Space Station.
The journey of Emirati astronaut Hany Neyadi will make him the fourth Arab individual to travel to space. His colleague Hazzaa al-Manoori spent eight days in 2019 on an expedition.
The three astronauts, namely Neyadi, Hoburg, and Fedyaev, are making their first space voyages.
Since the conflict in Ukraine put a strain on relations between the US and Russia, space has been a rare opportunity for the two countries to work together.
During their time aboard the ISS, the Crew-6 astronauts will carry out various scientific experiments.
The three astronauts are the sixth to be transported to the ISS using a SpaceX rocket. The previous crew members of the Endeavour capsule had already traveled to the station three times.
SpaceX is contracted by NASA to transport astronauts to the ISS on a six-month basis.
As the Crew-6 astronauts prepare to dock with the ISS, NASA noted that they would be handing over to the station’s crew members over the next couple of days.
Joining the crew of the ISS are Frank and Sergei Prokopyev of Russia, and NASA’s Dmitry Petelin.
They were originally supposed to return to Earth on the 28th of March. However, their Soyuz capsule was damaged during a space station docking in December.
The Soyuz capsule carrying the astronauts was launched from Kazakhstan. It was later rescheduled to return to Earth in September.