“Ao finishing a meteorological briefing before the launch planned for today, the teams from NASA, Axiom Space and SpaceX chose to cancel it due to a depression that has caused marginally strong winds at the landing site”, announced NASA, quoted by the EFE agency. .
According to the new schedule, subject to change, SpaceX’s Dragon Endeavor spacecraft, with the four members of the mission organized by the Texas company Axiom Space, will start the return trip to Earth on Sunday night, a day later than scheduled.
The controlled crash of the spacecraft in the high seas takes place on Monday, according to Axiom and SpaceX.
This changes the launch plans for the Falcon 9 rocket, which will put SpaceX’s Dragon Freedom into space, which, with three astronauts from NASA and one from the European Space Agency, is destined for the International Space Station (ISS).
The launch will take place on April 27, if there are no further changes, and the spacecraft is expected to arrive at the ISS the following day.
Crew-4 mission elements are Commander Kjell Lindgren, Pilot Robert Hines and Specialist Jessica Watkins, all three from NASA, as well as Italian Specialist Samantha Cristoforetti from the European Space Agency.
The members of the Ax-1 mission, the first entirely private to reach the ISS, are Hispanic-American Michael López Alegría and businessmen Larry Connor (USA), Mark Pathy (Canada) and Eytan Stibbe (Israel), who paid, according to the US media, $55 million each to join the mission.
SpaceX’s Dragon Endeavor capsule began its journey on April 8 at the tip of a Falcon rocket, which took off from Cape Canaveral and arrived at EEI the next day.
Dragon Freedom cannot start its journey if the Harmony module is occupied, which is currently the case with Endeavor, which should have returned to Earth on April 19.
The Ax-1 crew has carried out scientific experiments and educational and commercial activities on the EEI.
Authorities say the crew has plenty of supplies for an extended stay at the station.
SpaceX has seven landing zones for the Dragon missions, four in the Gulf of Mexico and three off the coast of Florida.
The company has two recovery vessels, which it splits between the Gulf and Atlantic regions for each crew return.
Axiom Space was founded in 2016 with the purpose of creating the first commercial space station, whose first module is expected to be launched in 2024.
Prior to the Axiom Space mission, SpaceX had already flown astronauts from NASA and European counterpart ESA to the International Space Station, replacing the long-standing Russian transport provided by Russian space agency Roscosmos’ Soyuz spacecraft.
On April 2, Roscosmos announced that it will present “concrete proposals” for dates to end cooperation in the ISS, after Western counterparts refused to lift sanctions on Russian companies following Russia’s February invasion of Ukraine.
On December 8th, the eccentric Japanese millionaire Yusaku Maezawa traveled to the EEI for a 12-day stay, thanks to a partnership between Roscosmos and Space Adventures, an American company that exclusively sells flights on Soyuz spacecraft to “home” of astronauts in Earth orbit.
The International Space Station is the result of a partnership between NASA, ESA, Roscosmos and the Canadian counterparts CSA and Japanese JAXA.
Read too: SpaceX sends 40 small satellites into space
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