Highlights

    • An international crew of astronauts is en route to the International Space Station following a successful launch on the first NASA-certified commercial human spacecraft system in history. NASA’s SpaceX Crew-1 mission lifted off from Launch Complex 39A at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

    • The SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket propelled the Crew Dragon spacecraft with NASA astronauts Michael Hopkins, Victor Glover, and Shannon Walker, along with Soichi Noguchi of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), into orbit to begin a six-month science mission aboard the space station.

    • The Crew Dragon spacecraft, named Resilience, will dock autonomously to the forward port of the station’s Harmony module on 16th Nov.

    • Earlier Boeing and SpaceX were selected by NASA in September 2014 to develop transportation systems meant to transfer crew from the US to the ISS.

    • The Crew-1 mission is the first of six crewed missions NASA and SpaceX will fly as part of the agency’s Commercial Crew Program.

    • This mission has several firsts, including:

    a. The first flight of the NASA-certified commercial system designed for crew transportation, which moves the system from development into regular flights;

    b. The first international crew of four to launch on an American commercial spacecraft;

    c. The first time the space station’s long duration expedition crew size will increase from six to seven crew members, which will add to the crew time available for research; and

    d. The first time the Federal Aviation Administration has licensed a human orbital spaceflight launch.

Mission Objectives

    • Crew will conduct science and maintenance during a six-month stay aboard the orbiting laboratory and will return in spring 2021.

    • It is scheduled to be the longest human space mission launched from the United States.

    • Crew Dragon also is delivering more than 500 pounds of cargo, new science hardware and experiments inside, including 

        ◦ Food Physiology, a study of the effects of an optimized diet on crew health and, 

        ◦ Genes in Space-7, a student-designed experiment that aims to better understand how spaceflight affects brain function, enabling scientists to keep astronauts healthy as they prepare for long-duration missions in low-Earth orbit and beyond.

    • Crew will also support 

    • a study using chips with tissue that mimics the structure and function of human organs to understand the role of microgravity on human health and diseases and translate those findings to improve human health on Earth, 

    • growing radishes in different types of light and soils as part of ongoing efforts to produce food in space, and 

    • testing a new system to remove heat from NASA’s next generation spacesuit, the Exploration Extravehicular Mobility Unit (xEMU).

    • They also will conduct a variety of spacewalks and welcome crews of the Russian Soyuz vehicle and the next SpaceX Crew Dragon in 2021.

At the conclusion of the mission, the Crew-1 astronauts will board Crew Dragon, which will then autonomously undock, depart the space station, and re-enter Earth’s atmosphere. Crew Dragon also will return to Earth important and time-sensitive research. NASA and SpaceX are capable of supporting seven splashdown sites located off Florida's east coast and in the Gulf of Mexico. Upon splashdown, the SpaceX recovery ship will pick up the crew and return to shore.

(The author is a trainer for Civil Services aspirants. The views expressed here are personal.)