Tag: NASA’s SpaceX Crew-6 mission

Crew-6 Enters Quarantine for Mission to Space Station

The four crew members that comprise the SpaceX Crew-6 mission pose for a photo in their spacesuits during a training session at the company's headquarters in Hawthorne, California. From left are, Mission Specialist Andrey Fedyaev, Pilot Warren "Woody" Hoburg, Commander Stephen Bowen, and Mission Specialist Sultan Alneyadi.
The four crew members who comprise the SpaceX Crew-6 mission pose for a photo in their spacesuits during a training session at the company’s headquarters in Hawthorne, California. From left are, Mission Specialist Andrey Fedyaev, Pilot Warren “Woody” Hoburg, Commander Stephen Bowen, and Mission Specialist Sultan Alneyadi. Photo credit: SpaceX

NASA astronauts Stephen Bowen and Warren “Woody” Hoburg, UAE (United Arab Emirates) astronaut Sultan Alneyadi, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev entered their official quarantine period beginning Sunday, Feb. 12, in preparation for their flight to the International Space Station on NASA’s SpaceX Crew-6 mission.

The process of flight crew health stabilization is a routine part of final preparations for all missions to the space station. Spending the final two weeks before liftoff in quarantine will help ensure Crew-6 members are healthy, as well as protect the astronauts already on the space station.

Crew members can choose to quarantine at home if they are able to maintain quarantine conditions prior to travel to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. If quarantining at home is not possible – for example, if a household member can’t maintain quarantine because of job or school commitments – crew members have the option of living in the Astronaut Quarantine Facility at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston until they leave for Kennedy.

NASA’s SpaceX Crew-6 mission is the sixth crew rotation mission with SpaceX to the space station, and the seventh flight of Dragon with humans aboard. The mission is targeted to launch no earlier than 2:07 a.m. EST Sunday, Feb. 26, on SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft – named Endeavour – atop the company’s Falcon 9 rocket from Launch Complex 39A at Kennedy. Mission operations teams will be closely monitoring the weather leading up to liftoff.

After docking, the Crew-6 crewmates will be welcomed inside the station by the seven-member crew of Expedition 68. Following a handover on the space station with Crew-6, NASA’s SpaceX Crew-5 crew members will undock from the space station.

More details about the mission can be found on the Crew-6 blog, in the press kit online and by following the commercial crew blog, @commercial_crew and commercial crew on Facebook.

Briefings, Interviews Set for NASA’s SpaceX Crew-6 Mission

NASA's SpaceX Crew-6 astronauts
The four crew members who comprise NASA’s SpaceX Crew-6 mission are seated inside the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft during a training session at the company’s headquarters in Hawthorne, California. From left are Mission Specialist Andrey Fedyaev, Pilot Woody Hoburg, Commander Stephen Bowen, and Mission Specialist Sultan Al Neyadi. Photo credit: SpaceX

A pair of news conferences on Wednesday, Jan. 25, at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston will highlight the agency’s SpaceX Crew-6 mission to the International Space Station in February. The mission is NASA’s sixth crew rotation flight involving a U.S. commercial spacecraft carrying crew for a science expedition aboard the microgravity laboratory.

First up, a mission overview news conference at noon EST, followed by a crew news conference at 2 p.m. Both will air live on NASA Television, the NASA app, and the agency’s website.

The Crew-6 mission will carry NASA astronauts Stephen Bowen and Warren Hoburg, as well as UAE (United Arab Emirates) astronaut Sultan Alneyadi, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev. Crew members also will be available for individual interviews after 3:30 p.m.

The Falcon 9 rocket, with Dragon Endeavour spacecraft atop, scheduled to launch no earlier than Feb. 26 from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Click here to read the full release.

NASA Updates Commercial Crew Flight Manifest to Space Station

NASA meatballNASA and its mission partners are gearing up for a busy 2023 with crew launches and returns from the International Space Station. NASA worked closely with its international partners and commercial crew providers, Boeing and SpaceX, to secure new target launch dates for the upcoming flights that are optimal for space station needs.

NASA’s Boeing Crew Flight Test astronauts Barry “Butch” Wilmore and Sunita “Suni” Williams
NASA’s Boeing Crew Flight Test astronauts Barry “Butch” Wilmore and Sunita “Suni” Williams pose for a picture during T-38 pre-flight activities at Ellington Field in Houston on Aug. 16, 2022. Photo credit: NASA/Robert Markowitz

Starliner Flight Date Targets

NASA and Boeing now are targeting April 2023 for the agency’s Crew Flight Test (CFT), the first flight with astronauts on the company’s CST-100 Starliner. The date adjustment deconflicts visiting spacecraft traffic at the space station as NASA and Boeing work together to achieve flight readiness.

The team continues to make progress toward Starliner’s crewed flight following the successful uncrewed Orbital Flight Test-2 (OFT-2) to the space station in May. Starliner and United Launch Alliance’s Atlas V rocket hardware remain on track for readiness in early 2023. The joint team continues to close out the OFT-2 anomalies and partner closely together to identify forward work and ensure all requirements for crewed flight are met. NASA and Boeing currently are working on a variety of verification efforts across several critical systems that will be used for Starliner’s crew flight certification.

For CFT, Boeing recently completed the exterior of the Starliner crew module with the installation of the forward heat shield and entry cover. The previously flown crew module, named Calypso, will be connected to a new service module later this year. Formal qualification testing on the CFT version of Starliner’s flight software was completed last month. NASA astronauts Barry “Butch” Wilmore and Suni Williams, CFT’s commander and pilot, respectively, and Mike Fincke, backup spacecraft test pilot, along with the Boeing team, also successfully completed the crew validation test during which the astronauts suited up and tested out the pressurized crew module to ensure seat fit, suit functionality, cabin temperature, audio system and day of launch operations.

The CFT astronauts will live and work on the space station for about two weeks. Following a successful crewed flight, NASA will work to complete certification of the Starliner spacecraft and systems for regular crew rotation missions to the space station. A launch date for NASA’s Boeing Starliner-1 mission will be determined following a successful flight test with astronauts and close out of the agency’s certification work.

SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft for NASA's SpaceX Crew-5 mission
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket with the company’s Dragon spacecraft onboard is seen at Kennedy Space Center’s Launch Complex 39A on Oct. 1, 2022, four days before liftoff of NASA’s SpaceX Crew-5 mission. Photo credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky

SpaceX Flight Date Targets

NASA and SpaceX are targeting mid-February 2023, for launch of the agency’s Crew-6 mission to the International Space Station.

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will launch Dragon and NASA astronauts Stephen Bowen and Woody Hoburg, United Arab Emirates astronaut Sultan AlNeyadi, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrei Fedyaev to the space station from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The crew will spend approximately six months on the space station, starting with a short handover with Crew-5, which arrived at the station in October for a science expedition at the microgravity laboratory.

SpaceX certification and Falcon 9 hardware remain on track for the sixth crew rotation mission of the company’s human space transportation system and its seventh flight with NASA astronauts, including the Demo-2 test flight, to the space station.

The Crew-6 mission will be Dragon Endeavour’s fourth flight to the space station, which previously supported the Demo-2, Crew-2, and Axiom Mission 1 (Ax-1)  missions, making the spacecraft the fleet leader in number of flights to and from the station. The Dragon spacecraft currently is undergoing refurbishment at SpaceX’s Dragonland facility at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.

NASA and SpaceX also are targeting fall 2023 for launch of the agency’s Crew-7 mission to the International Space Station, ahead of the return of Crew-6.

Find out more about NASA’s Commercial Crew Program at:

https://www.nasa.gov/commercialcrew