Just 19 hours after lifting off from Kennedy Space Center, Florida, SpaceX could be just half an hour away from docking NASA astronauts with a massive orbital space station known as the ISS.
Thus far, things have gone spectacularly smoothly. Marking Falcon 9’s first crewed launch ever, things went about as well as they could have from liftoff through orbital insertion. Reusable booster B1058 even managed to safely land aboard drone ship Of Course I Still Love You (OCISLY) for the first time, hopefully ensuring many more flights for the SpaceX rocket over the next several months and years. In fact, according to a NASA rocket certification engineer, the space agency may actually certify flight-proven SpaceX rockets to launch astronauts, meaning that B1058 (or possibly B1061) could help send even more humans into orbit sometime in the near future.
For now, though, tune in live at the link below to watch as SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft guides NASA astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS) for the first time ever. If successful, the docking will mark the first time in almost nine years that US astronauts have reached the space station aboard an American spacecraft.
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