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4 astronauts are headed to the Worldwide Area Station the place they may oversee the arrival of two new rocket ships throughout their six-month keep.
SpaceX’s Falcon rocket blasted off from Kennedy Area Heart on Sunday carrying NASA’s Matthew Dominick, Michael Barratt and Jeanette Epps and Russia’s Alexander Grebenkin.
The astronauts ought to attain the orbiting lab on Tuesday.
They are going to change a crew from the US, Denmark, Japan and Russia who’ve been there since August.
“When are you getting right here already?” house station commander Andreas Mogensen requested through social media platform X, after three days of delays as a result of excessive wind.
SpaceX Launch Management termed it “fashionably late”.
There was virtually one other postponement on Sunday evening when a small crack within the seal of the SpaceX capsule’s hatch prompted a last-minute flurry of opinions earlier than it was deemed protected for the entire mission.
The brand new crew’s six-month keep consists of the arrival of two rocket ships ordered by NASA.
Boeing’s new Starliner capsule with check pilots is due in late April.
A month or two later, Sierra Area’s Dream Chaser, a mini-shuttle, ought to arrive.
The shuttle is for delivering cargo to the station, not passengers – but.
Epps was initially assigned to fly Boeing’s Starliner, which acquired slowed down with issues and stalled.
NASA lastly switched her to SpaceX.
“I’m in a New York mind-set proper now,” she stated upon reaching orbit, referring to the Billy Joel track.
“It’s superb.”
Epps, from Syracuse, New York, is the second Black girl assigned to an extended station mission.
She stated earlier than the flight she was particularly proud to be a job mannequin for Black ladies, demonstrating that spaceflight “is an choice for them, that this isn’t only for different folks”.
An engineer, she labored for Ford Motor Co. and the CIA earlier than changing into an astronaut in 2009, Epps ought to have launched to the house station on a Russian rocket in 2018 however was changed for causes by no means publicly disclosed.
Additionally new to house are Dominick, a Navy pilot, and Grebenkin, a former Russian navy officer.
Barratt, a health care provider on his third mission who turns 65 in April, is the oldest full-time astronaut to fly in house.
“It is form of like a curler coaster journey with a bunch of actually excited youngsters,” Barratt stated after reaching orbit.
As for his age, he stated earlier than the flight: “So long as we keep wholesome and match and engaged, we’re good to fly.”
Flight controllers are monitoring a rising cabin leak on Russia’s aspect of the house station.
The leak has doubled in measurement up to now few weeks and the realm has been sealed off, NASA program supervisor Joel Montalbano stated.
He confused there was no influence on station operations or crew security.
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