SpaceX, the space company of founder Elon Musk, is preparing for another ‘historic space mission’. After people were first sent to space with the commercial company on May 30, a first operational flight, with four astronauts on board, will set course for the International Space Station (ISS) on November 14: Crew Dragon Resilience makes its appearance.
The mission, dubbed USCV-1 (United States Crew Vehicle 1), is the first missionary spaceflight of a Crew Dragon space capsule. It is now SpaceX’s second manned mission. Just like last time, the capsule will be fired with a Falcon 9 rocket from the Kennedy Space Center, the launch site of the US space agency NASA at Cape Canaveral in Florida.
This time not two crew members, but four: a major upgrade in the context of space tourism. The four crew members have been waiting for the launch for two years now.
In 2018, NASA astronauts Mike Hopkins, Victor Glover, and Shannon Walker, and Soichi Noguchi of the Japanese space agency (JAXA) were already selected.
Normally, the launch would have taken place at the end of August, but due to the numerous delays the program had encountered, the date was postponed to September, October, and finally to mid-November. If all goes well, the crew will depart for the ISS on November 14, where the crew will stay for six months.
