SpaceX Crew Dragon arrives at Kennedy launch complex
The plan to fly astronauts from U.S. soil for the first time since the space shuttle era is one step closer as the SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule arrived at Launch Complex 39A at Kennedy Space Center over the weekend.
NASA tweeted out images of the spacecraft’s arrival. It will be mated with a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket ahead of the planned launch on May 27.
The spacecraft made the trip from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station processing facility on Friday.
While both SpaceX and Boeing have been working toward becoming the astronaut ferry service for NASA for several years, it was SpaceX that pulled ahead as part of the Commercial Crew Program.
The flight will be the first to launch U.S. astronauts from U.S. soil since Space Shuttle Atlantis in 2011.
Designated SpaceX Demo-2, astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley, will take the ride up to the ISS in what SpaceX hopes will be the final certification needed before it begins regular transportation service. The two are currently in quarantine at Johnson Space Center in Houston, but will arrive Wednesday to KSC ahead of Thursday’s Flight Readiness Review.
It would mean NASA could stop relying on Russian-made Soyuz launches to get its personnel to and from the station at a cost of $80 per person.
Boeing is also working on a crew capsule, the CST-100 Starliner, but because of launch issues on its first uncrewed test flight, will have to perform it again before NASA lets humans on board.
The SpaceX launch is slated for 4:32 p.m. on May 27 with a back-up window available on May 30. The two astronauts will go into low Earth orbit before docking with the ISS, where they will stay for an undetermined amount of time before returning to Earth for splashdown aboard Crew Dragon in the Atlantic Ocean in the same manner as the old Apollo mission capsule returned to Earth.