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On Thursday, March 2, 2023, a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying four astronauts, two Americans, a Russian and an Emirati, was launched towards the International Space Station, after the operation was canceled at the last moment, Monday.
The rocket was launched Thursday from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 00:34 local time (05:34 GMT).
“The Crew 6 crew was launched on March 2 at 00:34 (US EST, 05:34 GMT) … into orbit in the Dragon capsule,” the agency wrote on Twitter.
The “Dragon” capsule, which transports the four astronauts, will dock with the station on Friday at 01:17 local time (06:17 GMT), after a journey that takes more than 24 hours.
And Monday, the launch was canceled at the last minute due to a technical issue. And NASA explained Wednesday that the problem was that the fluid used to ignite the engines did not reach due to a “clogged filter device.”
The four astronauts, the Americans Stephen Boone and Warren Hoberg, the Russian Andrey Vidyaev and the Emirati Sultan Al Neyadi, are scheduled to spend six months on the International Space Station.
Sultan Al Neyadi, 41, will become the fourth astronaut from an Arab country, and the second Emirati to participate in a space mission, after Hazza Al Mansouri, who spent eight days on the International Space Station in September 2019.
The Crew 6 mission will be the first spaceflight of Warren Hoberg and Andrei Fedyaev.
This capsule, which will carry astronauts, has previously participated in three space flights.
A pick-up and delivery mission will take place between the Crew 6 crew and the Crew 5 crew members who arrived at the space station in October 2022. They will return to Earth in their own SpaceX vehicle as well, days after the delivery.
The International Space Station currently includes three astronauts (Russian and American) who arrived in a Russian Soyuz spacecraft.
The spacecraft had a leakage accident in December, and the return of its astronauts became very dangerous. And last Saturday, the Russian space agency “Roscomos” sent a relief vehicle to the International Space Station to return the three astronauts.
