SpaceX’s subsequent astronaut mission has been delayed by a robust storm.
The corporate had been planning to launch the Crew-9 mission to the Worldwide House Station (ISS) for NASA from Florida’s Cape Canaveral House Pressure Station on Thursday afternoon (Sept. 26).
Nonetheless, that focus on date has slipped by at the least two days, due to a maelstrom named Helene. Helene is a tropical storm in the mean time, however it’s anticipated to slam into Florida’s Gulf Coast on Thursday as a Class 3 hurricane. Thus, NASA and SpaceX now purpose to launch Crew-9 on Saturday (Sept. 28) on the earliest. Liftoff that day can be at 1:17 p.m. EDT (1717 GMT).
“Though Tropical Storm Helene is transferring via the Gulf of Mexico and anticipated to affect the Florida panhandle, the storm system is massive sufficient that top winds and heavy rain are anticipated within the Cape Canaveral and Merritt Island areas on Florida’s east coast,” NASA officers mentioned in an replace this afternoon (Sept. 24).
Crew-9’s Falcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon capsule, named Freedom, rolled out to the launch pad at the moment. Mission workforce members will conduct rehearsal actions with the {hardware} tonight, then roll the rocket-capsule combo “again to the hangar forward of any potential storm exercise,” NASA officers wrote.Â
Crew-9 will ship NASA’s Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov to the ISS. They will reside on the station for about 5 months, coming residence in February 2025.
Crew Dragon capsules normally carry 4 individuals to the orbiting lab, however NASA is saving two seats on Freedom for astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore, who want a experience again to Earth.
Williams and Wilmore arrived on the ISS in June on the first-ever crewed flight of Boeing’s Starliner capsule. That mission was presupposed to final simply 10 days or so, however after Starliner skilled thruster issues in orbit, NASA prolonged the capsule’s ISS keep whereas learning the problem. The company in the end determined to convey Starliner residence uncrewed, which occurred with out incident on Sept. 7. Williams and Wilmore stay aboard the ISS; they’re going to find yourself spending about eight months in orbit, if all goes in line with plan.
Associated: Meet the SpaceX Crew-9 astronauts launching to the Worldwide House Station Sept. 26
As its title suggests, Crew-9 would be the ninth operational astronaut mission SpaceX launches to the ISS for NASA. Elon Musk‘s firm has six different crewed flights beneath its belt as effectively — a check mission to the station for NASA in 2020, three personal flights to the ISS and two business efforts that circled Earth solo.
Like SpaceX, Boeing holds a contract with NASA’s Industrial Crew Program. It is unclear, nevertheless, when the aerospace large will launch its first long-duration crewed flight to the ISS, given the problems that Starliner skilled on the latest check flight.
