Two days after its launch from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, the SpaceX Dragon cargo spacecraft arrived at the International Space Station on Sunday, March 3, where it was captured by Expedition 34 Commander Kevin Ford of NASA and NASA Flight Engineer Tom Marshburn using the station's Canadarm2 robotic arm.
March 1st is the targeted launch date for the next cargo resupply flight to the International Space Station. Liftoff of the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft's second resupply mission to the ISS is scheduled for 10:10 a.m. Eastern from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.
Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) today successfully launched its Dragon spacecraft aboard a Falcon 9 rocket on the first official cargo resupply mission to the International Space Station. The launch went off on schedule at 8:35 p.m. ET from Launch Complex 40 in Cape Canaveral, Florida.
The historic launch of the first-ever contracted cargo resupply flight to the International Space Station by Space Exploration Technologies Corporationis ready. Also, cybersecurity; Antares rollout; hangin' out on Google; the Hubble constant; space orchestra, and more!
The pre-launch briefing of Commercial Resupply Mission 1 (CRS-1), the first of twelve missions by the SpaceX/Dragon spacecraft to the International Space Station under NASA's Commercial Resupply Services contract.
"SSEP offers a unique flight opportunity that allows students to experience both the excitement and the challenges inherent in conducting research in a microgravity environment," said Roosevelt Johnson, deputy associate administrator for education at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "It really is STEM [science, technology, engineering and mathematics] in action, using the International Space Station -- which has America's only orbiting National Laboratory -- to host these students' science experiments. Twenty-three microgravity experiments designed by participants of the Student Spaceflight Experiment Program (SSEP) will become part of space history Oct. 7. They will be launched to the International Space Station aboard the SpaceX Dragon, the first commercially developed and built American spacecraft to fly a resupply cargo resupply mission to the station." More
Twenty-three microgravity experiments designed by participants of the Student Spaceflight Experiment Program (SSEP) will become part of space history Oct. 7.
Face it: no one outside of the space community is listening to space advocates.
This morning, at approximately 8:42 AM Pacific/11:42 AM Eastern, Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) completed its historic mission when the Dragon spacecraft splashed down safely in the Pacific. The vehicle will now be recovered by boats and start the trip back to land.
Expedition 31 Flight Engineers Don Pettit and Andre Kuipers grappled Dragon at 9:56 a.m. (EDT) with the Canadarm2 robotic arm and used the robotic arm to berth Dragon to the Earth-facing side of the station's Harmony node at 12:02 p.m. May 25, 2012.
The International Space Station crew successfully captured the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft at 9:56 am EDT. It was berthed to the ISS exactly 3 hours later.
- First Images of Dragon Captured by ISS
- Images: Berthing Dragon
The SpaceX Dragon spacecraft launched by the Falcon 9 rocket on May 22 is seen flying under the International Space Station at a distance of about 1.5 miles on May 24. While in this ISS "zone," tests verified rendezvous and communications capabilities between the uncrewed capsule and the orbiting laboratory.
Watch these videos of the reaction of the SpaceX employees on hearing Dragon was in orbit and the solar panels had deployed as well as watching Elon Musk's as the Falcon 9 is launched.
SpaceX has released this first look inside the Dragon spacecraft in orbit preparing for its attempted rendezvous with the International Space Station three days from now. The Dragon spacecraft has 306 kilograms of non-critical food and crew provisions headed to the ISS. The Dragon spacecraft also has another 154 kilograms of non-critical utilization payloads including a NanoRacks Module student experiments and ice bricks.
The SpaceX Dragon capsule, which on Tuesday became the first commercially developed and built spacecraft to launch to the International Space Station, is carrying among its cargo a suite of 15 science experiments designed by students.
SpaceX Dragon Transports Student Experiments to Space Station
"The SpaceX Dragon capsule, which on Tuesday became the first commercially developed and built spacecraft to launch to the International Space Station, is carrying among its cargo a suite of 15 science experiments designed by students. Known collectively as Aquarius, the experiments will assess the effects of microgravity on physical, chemical and biological systems. The students have been immersed in every facet of research, from definition of the investigation to experiment design, proposal writing and a formal NASA proposal review for selection of flight experiments."
At 3:44 a.m. EDT a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket with the Dragon spacecraft successfully lifted off from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Space Station launch complex 40 for its maiden voyage to the International Space Station on its second demonstration flight as part of the NASA Commercial Orbital Transportation Services program.
NASA Ames: Decades of rigorous research, testing and development performed in the Entry Systems and Technology Division at NASA's Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif., has garnered Ames' thermal protection engineers the respect of not just other government agencies, but also commercial entities.
In this week at NASA the three newest residents of the International Space Station were greeted by their Expedition 31 crewmates after their Soyuz capsule docked safely with the orbiting laboratory following its two day-plus journey from Kazakhstan. Soyuz commander Gennady Padalka, NASA flight engineer Joe Acaba, and Russian flight engineer Sergei Revin are slated to spend the next five months on the station.
Right up to t-minus 0.5 seconds it looked like there was going to be a launch. Unfortunately the Falcon 9 computer shutdown the rocket just as it was set to launch due to a high pressure reading on engine number 5, one of nine engines on the Falcon 9 first stage.