Month: May 2021

Watch NASA’s live coverage as astronauts Michael Hopkins, Victor Glover, and Shannon Walker of NASA, and Soichi Noguchi of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) inside the SpaceX Crew Dragon Resilience spacecraft are about one hour away from splashing down in the Gulf of Mexico at 2:57 a.m. EDT. Weather conditions remain within the splashdown weather criteria and are “Go” at the primary targeted site off the coast of Panama City, Florida.

Here are the upcoming milestones (all times Eastern):

All times approximate:

• 1:57 a.m. – Crew Dragon performs claw separation. The claw is located on Crew Dragon’s trunk, connecting thermal control, power, and avionics system components located on the trunk to the capsule.
• 1:58 a.m. – Trunk separation
• 2:03 a.m. – Deorbit burn begins
• 2:19 a.m. – Deorbit burn complete
• 2:22 a.m. – Nosecone closed
• 2:40 a.m. – Crew Dragon maneuvers to attitude for re-entry
• 2:52 a.m. – Drogue parachutes deploy at about 18,000 feet in altitude while Crew Dragon is moving approximately 350 miles per hour.
• 2:53 p.m. – Main parachutes deploy at about 6,000 feet in altitude while Crew Dragon is moving approximately 119 miles per hour.
• 2:57 p.m. – Splashdown

More details about the mission and NASA’s commercial crew program can be found by following the commercial crew blog, @commercial_crew and commercial crew on Facebook.

Learn more about station activities by following @space_station and @ISS_Research  on Twitter as well as the ISS Facebook and ISS Instagram accounts.

Watch live coverage now on NASA TV and the agency’s website as undocking preparations continue for the return of NASA’s SpaceX Crew-1 mission with astronauts Michael Hopkins, Victor Glover, and Shannon Walker of NASA, and Soichi Noguchi of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) from the International Space Station.

After the Crew-1 astronauts closed the Dragon hatch at 6:26 p.m. EDT, Expedition 65 astronauts closed the hatch of the orbital laboratory. With Crew-1 astronauts seated inside SpaceX’s Crew Dragon Resilience spacecraft, teams are conducting standard leak checks and depressurization of the space between the spacecraft, called the vestibule, in preparation for its undocking and return to Earth.

NASA and SpaceX are targeting 8:35 p.m. for Crew Dragon to autonomously undock from the space station, with its four international crew members aboard the spacecraft, and return to Earth. After hooks holding Crew Dragon in place retract, two very small engine burns at 8:30 p.m. and 8:32 p.m. will fire to separate the spacecraft from the station.

Conditions remain “Go” at the primary targeted site, off the coast of Panama City, Florida, for splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico about 2:57 a.m. on Sunday, May 2.

More details about the mission and NASA’s commercial crew program can be found by following the commercial crew blog, @commercial_crew and commercial crew on Facebook.

Learn more about station activities by following @space_station and @ISS_Research on Twitter as well as the ISS Facebook and ISS Instagram accounts.

At 6:26p.m. EDT, the hatch closed between the Crew Dragon Resilience spacecraft and the International Space Station in preparation for undocking and return to Earth of NASA’s SpaceX Crew-1 mission with astronauts Michael Hopkins, Victor Glover, and Shannon Walker of NASA, and Soichi Noguchi of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).

NASA Television will air live coverage beginning at 8:15 p.m. for undocking scheduled at 8:35 p.m. and continue coverage through their splashdown off the coast of Panama City, Florida, at about 2:57 a.m. EDT on Sunday, May 2 and their recovery from the spacecraft.

More details about the mission and NASA’s commercial crew program can be found by following the commercial crew blog, @commercial_crew and commercial crew on Facebook.

Learn more about station activities by following @space_station and @ISS_Research on Twitter as well as the ISS Facebook and ISS Instagram accounts.

Watch live coverage now on NASA TV and the agency’s website as undocking preparations are underway for the return of NASA’s SpaceX Crew-1 mission with Michael Hopkins, Victor Glover, and Shannon Walker of NASA, and Soichi Noguchi of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) from the International Space Station.

NASA and SpaceX are targeting 8:35 p.m. EDT for Crew Dragon to autonomously undock from the space station, with four international crew members aboard the spacecraft, and return to Earth.

Almost six-and-a-half hours later, after jettisoning its trunk and re-entering Earth’s atmosphere, Crew Dragon will splash down in the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Florida about 2:57 a.m. EDT on Sunday, May 2. The primary splashdown target is Panama City, Florida.

NASA’s SpaceX Crew-1 return coverage is as follows (all times are Eastern):

Saturday, May 1

• 6 p.m. – NASA TV coverage begins for 6:20 p.m. hatch closure
• 8:15 p.m. – NASA TV coverage begins for 8:35 p.m. undocking

Sunday, May 2

• 2:57 a.m. (approx.) – Splashdown (NASA TV will provide continuous coverage from undocking to splashdown and crew recovery)
• 5 a.m. – Return to Earth news conference at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, with the following participants:

• Kathy Lueders, associate administrator, Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate, NASA Headquarters
• Steve Stich, manager, Commercial Crew Program, Kennedy Space Center
• Joel Montalbano, manager, International Space Station, Johnson
• Holly Ridings, chief flight director, Johnson
• Hans Koenigsmann, senior advisor, Flight Reliability, SpaceX
• Hiroshi Sasaki, vice president and director general, JAXA’s Human Spaceflight Technology Directorate

NASA’s SpaceX Crew-1 mission launched Nov. 15, 2020, on a Falcon 9 rocket from the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida for a six-month science mission aboard the orbiting laboratory. The astronauts named the spacecraft Resilience, in honor of their families, colleagues, and fellow citizens and highlighting the dedication displayed by the teams involved with the mission and demonstrating that there is no limit to what humans can achieve when they work together. Crew Dragon Resilience docked to the Harmony module’s forward port of the space station Nov. 16, nearly 27 hours after liftoff.

More details about the mission and NASA’s commercial crew program can be found by following the commercial crew blog, @commercial_crew and commercial crew on Facebook.

Learn more about station activities by following @space_station and @ISS_Research
on Twitter as well as the ISS Facebook and ISS Instagram accounts.