SpaceX’s Crew Dragon landed four or five astronauts who had spent the last 200 days on the International Space Station (ISS) in the waters near Florida today, half past five in the morning. Americans Shane Kimbrough and Megan McArthur, Frenchman Thomas Pesquet and Japanese Akihiko Hoshide were on their way out of orbit for about eight hours. A new four-member crew will soon set out on the ISS, and their rocket could take off as early as Thursday morning, CET, in good weather and technology.
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The crew’s descent was broadcast live by the US space agency NASA and SpaceX, which operates flights for NASA. The Crew Dragon spacecraft is controlled by an autopilot, who, after disconnecting from the ISS, took it for about an hour and a half to fly around the station, during which the crew mapped the condition of its exterior with the help of photographs.
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Crew Dragon then underwent a series of maneuvers, thanks to which he got into the desired position towards the Earth. The ship then slowed enough with its engines to rush into the Earth’s atmosphere at a speed of about 27,359 kilometers per hour.
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As it passes through increasingly dense air, the ship’s heat shield must face temperatures of up to 1900 degrees Celsius. As expected, the crew lost contact with the control center for several minutes during the descent. However, the vessel emerged into the darkness over Florida in good condition and, after launching two series of parachutes, landed in the waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Rescue ships immediately rushed to the scene and picked up the capsule from the sea.
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SpaceX thus successfully deployed to the ISS and returned the third human crew in its Crew Dragon ships, which are being launched into orbit by the Falcon 9 missile. last year. In doing so, the US broke a nine-year gap during which it was unable to send a crew to the ISS in its ships and had to rely on the Russian Soyuz space program.
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The “Crew 3” crew, consisting of NASA astronauts Raja Chari, Tom Marshburn and Kayla Barron and ESA astronaut Matthias Maurer, was scheduled to launch the space station at the end of October. However, the start was postponed several times due to bad weather and unspecified health problems of one of the mission members. It is now planned to start the engines on Thursday at 03:03 CET.
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