SpaceX Crew Dragon today launched with astronauts, which collided last year

NASA is set to send a fresh crew to the international space station on Thursday, riding in a SpaceX Crew Dragon Capsule, including three flyers, which were assigned to flight after NASA participated in problems with Boeing’s distressed Starlineer Capsules last year after NASA.

The Pad at the Kennedy Space Center is set to EDT from 39A to EDT at 12:09, roughly takes the Earth’s rotation 9 rocket into alignment with the orbit of the space station – which is a requirement for the Rendezavas mission. If all goes well, the crew dragon will do the dock with a lab complex early Saturday.

Crew 11 Commander Zenna Cardman had originally expected to fly to the space station, but he and the crew 9 Cromate Stephanie Wilson Was hitting the flight Starlineer Astronauts Barry “Buch” Wilmor and Pilot Sunita Williams to bring back two seats to bring back after the other extended stay In space.

Wilmore and Williams flew to the orbital lab complex in the first pilot flight of a Stareller in June. But their stay in space was increased due to problems with Starlineer propulsion system. NASA managers finally opted to bring them down earlier this year Crew 9 riders on the crew 9 dragon, using the seats given by cardmen and Wilson.

“If I only think of it as a person, and how it impresses me, yes, of course, it was an unexpected change,” the cardman said. “But space flight is not about me or any person. It’s about what we can do together. None of us can do this by ourselves.

“Now I have the opportunity to train with this amazing, amazing crew. Life is a journey. It takes many turns, and I am grateful to come here.”

Crew 11 missions are the cardman’s co-pilot NASA’s Michael Finke, a 58-year-old-3-man veteran, who trained to ride Boeing’s Starlineer, as Japanese astronaut Kimia UE. The two handed over to Crew 11, in view of the problems that surfaced last year during the Starlineer Test flight, and before the launch again.

The fourth crew member is Russian Cosmonot Oleg Platonov, a space crook. Like his crew, he expected to ride in another spacecraft, in his case, a Russian Soyuz.

But he assigned Crew 11 as part of a joint US-Russian seat-SWAP program, the aim was to ensure that at least one representative of each country is always on ISS, even though a crew ship’s boat ship had to be sent to an emergency, but all its crew members should be taken with it. Platonov is the seventh cosmonot to fly a crew dragon under thegraction.

Finke said that the crew is more than ready to launch.

I have been calling my name since I returned from my final mission in 2011 after being posted on social media platform X. ,

His ride to the station – the crew Dragon Endeavor – is making its sixth flight, a new record for NASA and SpaceX.

Steven Stitch, manager of NASA’s commercial crew program, said SpaceX is working to certify the crew dragon for 15 flights. SpaceX Ferry ships are currently certified for five flights, but stitch said Endear’s detailed analysis of Endeavor’s flight history, performance and test results allowed NASA to clean the ship for the sixth flight.

“Our focus here is actually to reach this particular launch, to make sure that we have everything cleared for six flights, and then below the road, we may have a little more work to do based on a specific vehicle and how many flights it is.

“The overall targets were 15 flights, and we have reached there on many components. Now we are down for a handful that are actually only for six flights (confirmed).”

Hold with space station

The crew dragon will take 39 hours to catch the station on Saturday.

After going directly 1,200 feet below the outpost, the Endeavor will loop up, cross the front of the lab, and then the forward harmony to a point directly above the module’s space-facing port. From there, it will go straight down to docking directly at 3 o’clock

The crew will be welcomed by the crew 10 commander Anne McClen, Pilot Nicole Aarrs, Japanese Station Commander Takua Onishi and Cosmonot Kiril Peskov. Launched at station on 14 MarchApart from this, Soyuz MS -27/73S Cosmonots will be with Sergei Raizikov and Alexi Zubritsky as well as Johnny Kim of NASA, Launched from Kazakhstan on 8 April.

Also on board: Clothes and individual items for cardmen which were launched last year before its expected crew 9 flights. Those individual items included the birthday cards, including one of his father, a physicist who used to compete with the cardman from Crew 9 just before NASA in August.

She will celebrate her next birthday, turning 38 in October.

Cardman told CBS News, “My parents knew that I would be at the space station for my birthday last year, we thought, so they sent some items in advance so that I could feel at home while staying there. And now I will get a chance to see them.”

“My whole history, people who have brought me today, I think I think my parents, my parents on my birthday, to feel this from my parents in space is really special feeling special.”

The cardmen and their crew are replacing 10 flyers of the crew, planning to underrock on August 6, falling down to shut down the 145-day mission in the Pacific Ocean from the Southern California coast. Highlights included a spacewalk by McClane and Aires and a non-stop schedule of research and station maintenance.

“I am eager to do nothing for a few days,” McClen jokingly said what she saw at the forefront of returning to Earth. Onishi said he was eager to see his family again, “and was also taking a hot bath on the ground!”

Added, who said that he would miss the opportunity to put a picture of Earth from the convenience point of space: “Apart from what Anne and Tech said, I am really eager for a big, juicy burger on the beach.”

Plan for months in class

It is not yet known how long the crew at the space station will be 11.

By this point, long -term crew, the US and Russian, have usually spent about six months in the classroom. But starting with the Soyuz MS-27/73s mission, Russians have switched to eight months of stay. NASA may follow the suit starting with the crew 12 mission next year.

The proposed budget of the Trump administration for FY 2026 reduced NASA’s funding by about 25 percent, while the agency directed the agency to work on the ISS in favor of the more aggressive plan for the missions of the final crew for Mars.

NASA’s managers are now considering lengthen the crew’s stay and possibly to reduce the dragon crew four to three and perhaps only two, one American and one Russian. A lower crew will require a low -revival mission, saving additional funds. But this will reduce the amount of fast research which can be done.

No final decision has been taken.

“When we launch … we have a six -month mission period which we baseline,” stitch said. “We can expand the mission as required in real time because we better understand the reconciliation bill and the appropriation process and means relative to the overall station manifest.”

For her share, the cardman said she would welcome an additional two months in the class.

“I can’t wait to stay in space, and there would be two additional months a gift,” he said. “Yes, we are basic for six months right now, with the ability to extend that pending analysis. For me, it would also be a complete privilege to stay for a long time.”