Four astronauts transported by SpaceX’s Dragon capsule entered the International Space Station (ISS) on Tuesday, successfully completing the first trip of NASA’s new means of space transportation after nine years of dependence on Russia.
The first phase of docking with the ISS, called “soft capture”, ended on Tuesday at 04H01 GMT, according to live images transmitted by NASA on the internet. The second phase, or “hard catch”, took place a few minutes later.
The American astronauts Michael Hopkins, Victor Glover and Shannon Walker, and the Japanese Soichi Noguchi floated in zero gravity through the hatch into the interior of the ISS, where they were greeted with shouts and hugs by the three members of the station crew.
“Thank you so much for letting me say hello to all of you,” NASA’s Manned Space Flight Program Director Kathy Lauders told the astronauts in a video message. “I just want to tell you how proud of you we are,” he added.
The capsule, called “Resilience”, was launched by a Falcon 9 rocket from the private company SpaceX, NASA’s new means of space transport after nine years of dependence on Russia.
“It’s a great day for the United States and for Japan,” NASA chief Jim Bridenstine said at a news conference.
The SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket took off without failures and at the scheduled time from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida (southeast). “It was an incredible launch,” said Captain Hopkins, once in orbit.
Less than three minutes after takeoff, at an altitude of 90 km and while the rocket was traveling at 7,000 km / h, the first tier of the spacecraft detached without incident to return to Earth, as it will be reused in a mission scheduled for 2021 which will lead four astronauts to the ISS.
Twelve minutes after takeoff, at an altitude of 200 km and a speed of 27,000 km/h, the Dragon capsule detached itself from the second stage.
SpaceX confirmed that the capsule was in the correct orbit to reach the ISS just over 27 hours after liftoff.
The crew joined two Russians and one American on the ISS, where they will remain for six months.
This “operational” flight continues the successful demonstration mission carried out from May to August, in which two American astronauts were flown to the ISS and then safely brought to Earth by SpaceX.
SpaceX plans another two manned flights in 2021 for NASA and four missions to refuel the station in the next 15 months.
A purely private trip, through partner Axiom Space, is also planned for the end of 2021. NASA has hinted that American actor Tom Cruise could go to the ISS, which has not been confirmed.
“NASA was a complete disaster when we took over. Now it is once again the ‘hottest’ and most advanced space center in the world, by far!” Outgoing US President Donald Trump wrote on Twitter, appropriating the success of a plan launched under the tenure of its two predecessors.
Joe Biden, who will replace Trump in January, also praised NASA and SpaceX, but from another angle. “It is proof of the power of science and what we can achieve by combining innovation, ingenuity and determination,” the president-elect tweeted.
The mission suffered a problem with the cabin temperature control system, but it was quickly resolved. “It was just a small initial problem,” confirmed Kathy Lueders.