Weather Remains Primary Concern for Crew-6 Return

The official crew photo for NASA's SpaceX Crew-6 mission showcasing NASA astronauts Stephen Bowen and Woody Hoburg, UAE (United Arab Emirates) astronaut Sultan Alneyadi, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev.
The official SpaceX Crew-6 portrait with (from left), Mission Specialist and UAE (United Arab Emirates) astronaut Sultan Alneyadi; Pilot Woody Hoburg and Commander Stephen Bowen, both NASA astronauts; and Mission Specialist and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev.

NASA and SpaceX met Friday evening to continue close evaluations of weather conditions around Florida’s coastline as they consider the best options for Crew-6 to return to Earth. Teams are working toward an undocking opportunity of no earlier than 7:05 a.m. EDT on Sunday, Sept. 3, with the first potential splashdown opportunity no earlier than 12:07 a.m. on Monday, Sept. 4. Teams are proceeding to the next weather briefing scheduled for Saturday morning to continue assessing weather for the primary target. Additional undock and splashdown opportunities are available early next week if weather conditions continue to be unfavorable over the weekend.

The Dragon spacecraft, named Endeavour, remains healthy while currently docked to the International Space Station. Dragon has been cleared for departure and re-entry by the space station and Dragon mission management teams. Pre-departure checkouts of the spacecraft were conducted Friday with normal performance across all systems. Operations teams are not working any major issues and there are currently no constraints to flight.

For the current undocking opportunity, NASA TV coverage can be found of the agency’s television schedule.

Follow along for details about the crew’s return to Earth and NASA’s Commercial Crew Program on the Crew-6 blog, the space station blog, the commercial crew blog, @commercial_crew on X, and commercial crew on Facebook.