The first manned mission of the private company SpaceX has been successful: After their two-month stay on the ISS space station, the two astronauts successfully return to Earth. Even US President Trump congratulates.
Two months after the first manned launch of the “Crew Dragon” spaceship developed by the private company SpaceX to the ISS, two US astronauts are back on Earth. Robert Behnken and Douglas Hurley landed the “Endeavor” capsule in the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of the US state of Florida, as live recordings by the US space agency Nasa showed.
Behnken and Hurley launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida, in late May. It was the first time after almost a nine-year hiatus that astronauts flew to the ISS from the United States and the first time that they had been carried by a private space company. SpaceX had previously only transported cargo to the ISS. The last time astronauts flew to the ISS in summer 2011 was on the “Atlantis” space shuttle. Thereafter, NASA mothballed its space shuttle fleet for cost reasons and has since been dependent on Russia for flights to the ISS. At around 80 million euros per flight in a Russian Soyuz capsule, this was not only expensive, but also scratched the American ego.
Trump is watching the TV
President Donald Trump was all the more pleased after the successful mission: “It is great that NASA astronauts are returning to Earth after a very successful two-month mission. Thanks to everyone!” The landing in the water was very exciting. In fact, NASA’s own flights from the U.S. to the ISS had already been announced for 2017 – due to technical problems, funding difficulties and restructuring after Trump was elected as U.S. President, the project was postponed.
Before the return of the astronauts on Sunday, the cyclone “Isaias” near Florida had caused some worries: However, the low pressure area should move along the eastern coast of Florida – hundreds of kilometers away from the coast off Pensacola, the targeted landing site. The conditions were ideal there at the time of landing.
Meanwhile, the Russian space agency Roskosmos announced that two tourists will fly to the ISS again at the end of next year. They are said to take off from the Baikonur spaceport in Kazakhstan. At first, their names were not mentioned. The space agency had signed a contract with the specialized US company Space Adventures for space tourism. Such trips to the ISS have existed since 2001. The first of seven space tourists to date was the US multimillionaire Dennis Tito.
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