The SpaceX Crew-3 mission to the International Space Station has been delayed again, this time to November 10th at 9:03PM ET, NASA said Sunday. Although NASA had originally planned to have a changing of the guard with the Crew-2 astronauts greeting the Crew-3 team before Crew-2 departed, the space agency has decided to return the Crew 2 to Earth first, pushing that mission from Sunday to Monday, November 8th at 2:05PM ET, because of weather concerns.
Wednesday so far has an 80 percent chance of favorable weather for liftoff, SpaceX noted in a tweet on Sunday. If all goes to plan the craft will take off from Kennedy Space Center in Florida, and dock with the ISS at about 7:10PM ET on November 11th.
Following Crew-2’s return to Earth, Falcon 9 will launch Dragon’s third long-duration crew mission to the @Space_Station as soon as Wednesday, November 10; weather forecast is 80% favorable for liftoff pic.twitter.com/xOFGVw3fOP
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) November 7, 2021
After it was originally scheduled for an October 31st launch, the Crew-3 has seen several delays, for weather concerns, and once for a “minor medical issue” with one of the crew members. . Four astronauts—NASA’s Thomas Marshburn, Raja Chari, and Kayla Barron, and the European Space Agency’s Matthias Maurer— will travel aboard SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft to begin a six-month stay in orbit on the ISS.
Crew-3 is the third operational crewed flight for SpaceX as part of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, which uses private craft to bring NASA astronauts to and from the ISS. If it ever launches, it will be the fifth time Space X has sent people to orbit aboard its Crew Dragon; SpaceX launched two NASA astronauts to the ISS in May 2020.
NASA’s livestream coverage of the launch will be available on YouTube and on the agency’s website.
Author: Kim Lyons.
Source: Theverge
