NASA and SpaceX Target Thursday Liftoff for Crew-13 Mission to Space Station

NASA and SpaceX are targeting Thursday morning for the launch of Crew-13, the four-person mission that will carry a fresh crew to the International Space Station, according to NASA.

The Falcon 9 rocket is due to lift off from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida no earlier than 11:10 a.m. ET, with NASA’s live coverage starting at 9:20 a.m. ET. The SpaceX Dragon spacecraft is expected to reach the station under nine hours later and dock with the orbiting laboratory’s Harmony module, where the crew will join Expedition 75 for a multi-month science mission.

On board are NASA astronauts Jessica Watkins, the mission commander, and pilot Luke Delaney, alongside Canadian Space Agency astronaut Joshua Kutryk and Roscosmos cosmonaut Sergey Teteryatnikov, who will serve as mission specialists. Once aboard, the crew will conduct scientific experiments in microgravity and carry out station maintenance, which could include spacewalks, NASA said.

The flight was originally slated for mid-September but was pushed back after engineers found an oxidizer leak in the propulsion system of the Dragon capsule, NASA and SpaceX said. Once repaired, the crew completed a full dress rehearsal at the pad on Tuesday, and teams ran an integrated static fire of the Falcon 9 on Sunday.

Crew-13 will be the first NASA Commercial Crew rotation to the station since Crew-12 docked in mid-February, and the first time astronauts have launched to orbit from the United States since April’s Artemis II mission sent a crew around the Moon, according to USA Today.

Sources

• NASA — NASA Sets Crew-13 Launch, Docking Coverage
• NASA — NASA’s SpaceX Crew-13 on Way to Kennedy
• USA Today — No astronauts have launched from the US in 6 months. Crew-13 is next