NASA and SpaceX have provisionally cleared Crew Dragon for launch on the space station

NASA and SpaceX executives concluded a two-day flight readiness review on Tuesday and provisionally cleared a Falcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon capsule for launch Saturday, weather conditions and last-minute repairs permitting, on a flight to ferry four astronauts to the International Space Station.

“This is a great day,” said Kathy Lueders, director of space exploration at NASA headquarters. “But the next few days will also be great, and we will have to carefully go through our final preparation for the flight.

“This in-depth review today, and everyone’s approval to move forward, was a great first step towards flying.”

Takeoff from Kennedy Space Center’s historic Pad 39A is scheduled for 7:49 PM EST Saturday, with a backup opportunity available Sunday, 7:27 PM, if needed. The next chance is Wednesday at 6:16 pm.

Assuming a timely launch on Saturday, crew commander 1 Michael Hopkins, Victor Glover, Shannon Walker and Japanese astronaut Soichi Noguchi are expected to meet and dock at the space station around 4:20 am Sunday.

But the program is tight. Engineers plan to run a first-stage engine test Wednesday after work to replace a component in the rocket’s second-stage and then perform a detailed overhaul to make sure the engines are performing as required.

One of the nine first stage Merlin 1D engines had to be replaced and another was removed, serviced and reinstalled following the October 2 Falcon 9 launch disruption which grounded a Global Positioning navigation satellite System of the US Space Force.

SpaceX originally planned to test the “static fire” engine on Monday, but high winds and rain forced a delay on Tuesday. Work to replace a component in the rocket’s second stage then prompted testing to Wednesday.

“There’s really nothing, no worries here about running out of time to do that,” said Benji Reed, SpaceX’s senior Human Spaceflight Program Manager. “We still want to do static fire, you know, relatively quickly so we can evaluate that data.”

Following the test shot, Hopkins and his teammates plan to don their futuristic-looking spacesuits on Thursday and buckle up the Crew Dragon capsule atop Pad 39A for a rehearsal countdown. On the same day, mission managers will conduct a final launch readiness review to ensure all systems are “ready” for launch.

“Still looking at a launch right now Saturday at 7:49 pm Eastern,” said Steve Stich, manager of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program. “The weather looks good for that first chance on Saturday and we also have a backup on Sunday. We will approach things very methodically.”

Relatively good time is required for launch at Kennedy Space Center and into the Atlantic Ocean along a northeastern trajectory from Cape Canaveral to Ireland, where the crew Dragon could be forced to splash to the ground interrupting the launch.

In general, calm seas are also needed for the recovery of the Falcon 9’s first stage on a SpaceX drone stationed several hundred miles northeast of Cape Canaveral. Recovery is especially important this time around as SpaceX plans to use the booster for the next Crew Dragon launch in late March.

The long-awaited flight is the first operational use of a commercially developed SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule after an unmanned test flight in 2019 and a flew a 64-day test flight earlier this year that they carried astronauts Douglas Hurley and Robert Behnken at the International Space Station.

“Operational” in this context means that the Crew Dragon is the first commercially developed spacecraft ever certified by NASA to carry astronauts into orbit. It is also the first certified U.S. spacecraft to stay in space for up to 210 days.

Crew 1 astronauts plan to remain airborne for 197 days, eclipsing the US record of 84 days set by Skylab’s final crew in 1974

NASA is counting on SpaceX’s Crew Dragon, and ultimately on the Boeing CST-100 Starliner, to end the agency’s sole dependence on the Russian Soyuz spacecraft to transport US, European, Japanese and Canadian astronauts to and from the space station. .

NASA astronaut Kate Rubins used The last seat currently contracted by NASA on a Russian spacecraft when she joined two Russian cosmonauts for launch aboard the Soyuz MS-17 / 63S spacecraft on October 14.

With the arrival of crew-1 astronauts, the station’s expanded Expedition 64 crew will grow to seven. Four more astronauts will launch aboard the next Crew Dragon around March 30.

The next three-man crew of the Soyuz will arrive about 10 days later and Rubins, Sergey Ryzhikov and Sergey Kud-Sverchkov will return to Earth a week later. Crew 1 astronauts will follow suit around May 1st to conclude a six-month flight.