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NASA and Space X launch eighth crewed commercial mission

eighth commercial mission with NASA and SpaceX crew International Space Station (EEI) took off this Sunday from Florida after the launch was twice delayed due to high winds.

Takeoff took place as planned at 22:53 local time on the US East Coast (3:53 GMT) from the Kennedy Space Center in central Florida aboard the Dragon Endeavor spacecraft and from platform 39A. based on the Falcon 9 rocket.

NASA astronauts Matthew Dominic, Michael Barratt and Jeanette Epps, and Russian Roscosmos cosmonaut Alexander Grebenkin are traveling aboard SpaceX’s new commercial mission Crew-8.

Flights began in 2020. and allowed the United States to once again send astronauts from American soil after the cancellation of the space shuttle program in 2011.

Since the last flight of the space shuttle Atlantis into Earth orbit in 2011, NASA has been forced to use only Russian launch systems such as Soyuz to launch its astronauts into orbit.

Six months on the ISS

This Sunday’s launch is part of the Commercial Crew Program (CCP, in English), which aims to bring from the US “safe, reliable and economical transport for people” to the ISS and back as part of a partnership with American private business.

This is the eighth flight of the new crew. ninth human spaceflight on the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft to the ISS for PDAs.

If everything goes according to plan The astronauts are expected to arrive at the microgravity laboratory the next day. about his departure.

As in previous missions of the program, the astronauts They will stay aboard the ISS for six months.living and working as part of a team expected to consist of 11 people within a few days.

The current ISS crew, seven members of Expedition 70, are preparing to receive the quartet of Crew-8, which will dock at the forward port of the Harmony module.

They will explore space phenomena to improve people’s lives

New companions They will explore many cosmic phenomena to improve people’s lives.. They will study the mechanisms of neurological disorders and ways to prevent fluid changes that occur in astronauts living in space.

They will also analyze how microgravity affects plant growth and the role of algae in improving life support systems spaceships.

At the ISS, new travelers aim to be released approximately seven days after the arrival of SpaceX Crew-7 crew members Jasmine Moghbeli, Andreas Mogensen of the European Space Agency (ESA), Satoshi Furukawa of Japan’s JAXA, and Konstantin Borisov of Roscosmos.

The four members, who have been aboard the space station since August 27 last year, will disconnect from the spaceport aboard the Dragon spacecraft, Endurance, at a date yet to be set.

It is planned that four astronauts will conduct return journey after a day in Earth orbit before splashing down off the coast of Florida, ending a six-month mission in space.

For their part, the four new crew members will return to Earth in six months aboard the Dragon, which will also land at one of the ocean landing zones off the coast of Florida.

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