An international crew of four representing four countries is in orbit following a successful launch to the International Space Station on Saturday, from Launch Complex 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The agency's SpaceX Crew-7 mission is the seventh commercial crew rotation mission for NASA.
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched the Dragon spacecraft into orbit carrying NASA astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli, ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Andreas Mogensen, JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) astronaut Satoshi Furukawa, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Konstantin Borisov, for a science expedition aboard the orbital laboratory, NASA said.
During Dragon's flight, SpaceX will monitor a series of automatic spacecraft maneuvers from its mission control center in Hawthorne, California, and NASA teams will monitor space station operations throughout the flight from the Mission Control Center at the agency's Johnson Space Center in Houston.
Named Endurance, the Dragon spacecraft will dock autonomously to the space-facing port of the station's Harmony module at 8:39 a.m. Sunday, Aug. 27.
Crew-7 will join the space station's Expedition 69 crew. For a short time, the number of crew aboard the space station will increase to 11 until Crew-6 members return to Earth a few days later, said the agency. (QNA)
