SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft carrying four astronauts will return to Earth by Sunday morning (September 3) after a one-day weather delay to finish NASA’s Crew-6 mission. You can watch the event live online for free.
The hatch between the SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule named Endeavor and the International Space Station (ISS) is currently scheduled to close around Sunday afternoon 5 a.m. EDT (9 a.m. GMT). Endeavor will undock from the orbiting laboratory shortly thereafter. 7:05 a.m. EDT (11 a.m. GMT).
These Crew-6 mission milestones can be viewed live on Space.com, courtesy of NASA.Hatch close coverage starts at 5 a.m. EDT (9 a.m. GMT). There will then be a short break and the undocking coverage will begin. 6:45 a.m. EDT (10:45 GMT).
NASA and SpaceX originally aimed to bring the Crew-6 astronauts home on Saturday, but announced a 24-hour delay on Friday (September 1) morning. After a weather briefing early Saturday morning, mission managers decided to proceed with the berth and splashdown only if weather conditions were favorable.
“NASA and SpaceX are on track to undock at 7:05 a.m. ET on September 3, and are scheduled to splash down off the coast of Florida shortly after 12:15 a.m. ET on September 4.” said NASA. I wrote it in the update of X (Formerly known as Twitter). “Weather conditions for splashdown are improving and will be assessed prior to the crew leaving shore.”
Related: SpaceX Crew-6 and Crew-7 Astronaut Missions: Live Updates
Endeavor will then return to Earth and eventually splash down off the coast of Florida. Monday (September 4) 12:15 a.m. EDT (0415 GMT). You can also watch the return live on Space.com.Coverage begins on Sunday 11pm EDT (Monday 0300GMT).
The Crew 6 quartet of NASA astronauts Stephen Bowen and Warren “Woody” Hoberg, Sultan Al Neyadi of the United Arab Emirates, and Andrei Fezyaev of the Russian space agency Roscosmos is in orbit. I spent almost exactly six months there. Endeavor docked with the ISS on March 3.
Crew 6 departs just days after another SpaceX mission arrives. The four-person crew 7 arrived at the ISS on August 27th.
Crew-7 is a more international event than Crew-6. This new mission will involve four astronauts from four different space agencies: Jasmin Moghberg from NASA, Andreas Mogensen from the European Space Agency, Konstantin Borisov from Roscosmos, and Satoshi Furukawa from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency. will participate.