Space Travel
SpaceX's biggest is about to go higher. The CEO of space company SpaceX, Elon Musk, has announced that their biggest rocket prototype the Starship SN8 is ready to go on a 15-kilometer high test flight in the next week.
Jeanette Epps is going to make history as the first black woman on the ISS.
Epps is set to join NASA astronauts Sunita Williams and Josh Cassada on NASA's Boeing Starliner-1 mission, a six-month expedition aboard the orbiting space laboratory set to launch in 2021.
Mars won't be too crowded. French Professor Jean-Marc Salotti (Bordeaux Institut Nationwide Polytechnique) found that a small community of 110 people is sufficient to set up a self-sustaining colony on Mars. The settlers would live in an oxygen-filled glass dome where they would have to focus on building an agricultural industry to provide for themselves.
Space Perspective wants to make space tourism happen. The company plans to transport up to 8 tourists in a high-altitude, hydrogen-filled balloon to the stratosphere to get a view from an altitude of 100,000 feet. The ballon, called "Spaceship Neptune", has a pressurized cabin and will include both a bar and a restroom.
Test flights with research equipment will start in 2021 and, if all goes well, tourists can board the Neptune in three and a half years.
NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley will return to Earth from the ISS on SpaceX's Crew Dragon spacecraft in August. Their exact return date will depend on numerous factors such as weather conditions, the astronauts' work progress onboard ISS as well as the overall condition and performance of Crew Dragon.
As SpaceX employees and fans all over the world celebrate the success of the Crew Dragon Demo 2 mission that launched two American Astronauts off American soil to the International Space Station just last week, Elon Musk emailed the SpaceX staff to remind them of the next major goal they should turn their attention to.
“Please consider the top SpaceX priority (apart from anything that could reduce Dragon return risk) to be Starship”
The CEO underlined that Starship development progress needs to be accelerated "dramatically and immediately". As the company just fulfilled its first promises by delivering Nasa astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley to the International Space Station as part of the commercial crew program, it will now be able to allocate significantly more resources, in terms of both staff and finance to the development of the Starship program.
In his email, Elon also re-assured his employees that those who are considering moving to Texas in order to better support the companies new objectives, will be able to shuttle using a dedicated SpaceX aircraft.
The Dragon capsule docked at the International Space Station at 14:16(UTC), slightly ahead of schedule, 422km above the border between northern China and Mongolia. The completion of the docking procedure happened at 14:30(UTC).
The Dragon capsule launched yesterday from Cape Canaveral will dock to the International Space Station at 14:30(UTC). Although astronauts Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken are on board, the docking procedure should be fully automated.
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will make another attempt to launch two NASA astronauts to the space station today at 19:22(UTC). If the launch attempt is delayed once again due to the weather — there's currently a 50% chance of unfavourable launch weather — the next available launch window will be on Sunday, May 31, 19:00(UTC).
Astronauts Bob Behnken and Douglas Hurley are expected to dock Crew Dragon with the ISS about 19 hours after liftoff.
The crew access has been retracted and the emergency escape system is armed. The weather at Kennedy Space Center had been an issue earlier and will be tracked “all the way down to launch". At 3:56 p.m., SpaceX has begun fueling the Falcon 9 rocket.
NASA's SpaceX Demo-2 is set to launch in just 45 minutes. At 2:35 p.m. EDT, the Crew Dragon hatch has been closed, just 15 minutes before the Air Force One carrying Donald Trump flew over the launchpad 39A.
Everyday Astronaut's Tim Dodd is providing a livestream of NASA's SpaceX Demo-2 launch on his YouTube channel. Dodd is stationed about 3 miles away from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida to capture the launch of the first private spacecraft to transport astronauts into low-Earth orbit. The launch will be at 4:33 p.m. EDT.
NASA's SpaceX Demo-2 mission is set to launch on May 27 at 4:33 p.m. EDT. The SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon spacecraft will transport two NASA astronauts to the International Space Station to provide "critical data on the performance of the Falcon 9 rocket, Crew Dragon spacecraft, and ground systems, as well as in-orbit, docking, and landing operations".
With the first crewed space flight from American soil in nine years scheduled for Wednesday, Dough Hurley and Bob Behnken have completed their dress rehearsal. The two astronauts will be the first ones to fly in a SpaceX Falcon rocket and Crew Dragon capsule. The liftoff is scheduled for Wednesday 16:33 EDT (20:33 GMT / 21:33 BST).