Elon Musk's company SpaceX has successfully launched four astronauts from Florida to the International Space Station on the final mission of the original six missions it was awarded by NASA to fly to the space station.
This mission, known as Crew-6, will see a group of astronauts going up to the International Space Station for a six-month stay in orbit. For SpaceX, this is the sixth operational crew launch for NASA and the ninth human spaceflight that the company has carried out to date.
“Be sure to give SpaceX mission control five stars if you had a good time on the ride,” SpaceX mission control pleaded after the capsule reached orbit.
“ Thank you very much, that was wonderful,” replied Stephen Bowen, commander of Crew-6.
A little after midnight on Thursday morning, Crew-6 launched to the International Space Station, beginning a journey to the ISS that will take just over 24 hours. Since SpaceX's first crewed launch in May 2020, SpaceX has launched 34 astronauts on both government and private missions, bringing the total number of astronauts SpaceX has launched to 34, including both government and private missions.
The crew consists of two Americans, one Russian and one Emirati: NASA astronauts Warren Hoburg and Stephen Bowen, Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev as well as United Arab Emirates astronaut Sultan Alneyadi.
On the top of the Falcon 9 rocket, SpaceX launched a crew of astronauts into space in its Crew Dragon capsule called Endeavour. Currently, the rocket and capsule have both flown four missions as a result of the fact that both are reusable.
It has been revealed that a clogged filter in a ground system probably caused a problem with the fluid that is used to ignite the rocket's engines during SpaceX's first launch attempt on Monday. The issue was suspected to have been caused by a clogged filter in the ground system. To be able to launch on Thursday, SpaceX had to replace the filter and complete the verification steps.
In order to compete against Boeing's Starliner capsule, SpaceX developed its Crew Dragon spacecraft and fine-tuned its Falcon 9 rocket as part of NASA's competitive Commercial Crew program. However, Boeing's capsule remains in development, resulting in costly delays that are delaying the start of operational Starliner flights by at least a year.
SpaceX has been awarded additional missions by NASA, giving it a total of 14, compared to six missions from Boeing.
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