A SpaceX rocket successfully launched from Florida on Sunday night, (March 3, 2024), carrying a crew of three U.S. astronauts and a Russian cosmonaut en route to the International Space Station (ISS) for a six-month science mission in Earth orbit. The two-stage Falcon 9 rocket, topped with an autonomously operated Crew Dragon capsule named Endeavor, took off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral along Florida’s Atlantic coast at 10:53 p.m. EST (0353 GMT Monday).
During the live NASA-SpaceX webcast, the 25-story-tall rocketship ascended from the launch tower as its nine Merlin engines ignited, creating billowing clouds of vapor and a reddish fireball illuminating the night sky. According to SpaceX, the rocket consumes 700,000 gallons of fuel per second during launch. The Falcon’s upper stage successfully delivered Endeavor to its initial orbit nine minutes after liftoff, with live video from the cabin showing the four crew members strapped in side by side wearing their helmeted white-and-black flight suits.
“A big thank-you to SpaceX,” astronaut Matthew Dominick, 42, the flight commander and one of three spaceflight rookies aboard the capsule, radioed to control outside of Los Angeles. “Really honored to fly this new-generation spaceship with this new-generation crew,” chimed in NASA veteran Dr. Michael Barratt, 64, from his seat beside Dominick.
The crew members were scheduled to reach the space station early on Tuesday after a 16-hour flight, docking with the orbital laboratory some 250 miles (420 km) above Earth.
This mission, designated Crew 8, marks the eighth long-duration ISS team that NASA has flown aboard a SpaceX launch vehicle since the private rocket venture founded in 2002 by billionaire Elon Musk began sending U.S. astronauts to orbit in May 2020. The latest ISS crew is led by Dominick and Barratt, with Barratt serving as mission pilot.
The crew includes fellow NASA astronaut Jeanette Epps, 53, and cosmonaut Alexander Grebenkin, 41, both spaceflight rookies. Grebenkin is the latest cosmonaut to fly aboard a U.S. spacecraft under a ride-sharing deal signed in 2022 by NASA and the Russian space agency Roscosmos.
Crew 8 will be welcomed aboard the space station by seven current ISS occupants – three Russians and the four astronauts of Crew 7. Crew 8 is expected to remain aboard the space station until the end of August, conducting about 250 experiments in the microgravity environment.
The ISS, about the length of a football field, has been continuously operated by a U.S.-Russian-led consortium that includes Canada, Japan, and 11 European countries. It was conceived as a multinational venture to improve relations between Washington and Moscow following the end of the Cold War. NASA has committed to keeping the space station in operation for at least six more years.
(Reuters)