NASA announced on Tuesday the 24-hour postponement of the launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, initially scheduled for Sunday, and which should send three astronauts and one cosmonaut to the International Space Station (ISS).
The Americans Stephen Bowen and Warren Hoburg, the Russian Andrey Fedyaev and the Emirati Sultan al-Neyadi were scheduled to take off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Sunday at 02:07 (08:07 GMT), but they will have to wait until 13: 00 hours. :45 a.m. (7:45 a.m. GMT) on Monday, NASA officials say.
The astronauts and the cosmonaut will have to spend six months in orbit aboard the ISS. They arrived in Florida on Tuesday to begin final preparations for the mission.
“We need a little more time”
“When you look at the work we have left to do, mainly on the vehicle — getting Dragon (capsule) and Falcon 9 (rocket) ready to go … we’re a little behind,” said Steve Stich, head of the commercial crewed program. from NASA.
“And so we need a little more time,” he told reporters after a readiness review of the Falcon 9 and Dragon.
According to Steve Stich, several issues need to be addressed before launch, including further analysis of the thermal performance of certain outer skin cells in the Dragon capsule.
Return of Russian cosmonauts to Earth in September
NASA officials said they expect members of SpaceX’s Dragon Crew-6 mission to complete a five-day handover with the four Dragon Crew-5 members who have been aboard the ISS since October.
At the same time, the Russian space agency indicated on Tuesday that the return of an astronaut and two cosmonauts stranded on the International Space Station (ISS) due to a leak was not finally scheduled until September, a year after their flight into space.
In December, the Soyuz MS-22 spacecraft, attached to the ISS and which was to bring the American Frank Rubio and the Russians Sergei Prokopiev and Dmitri Peteline back to Earth, suffered a spectacular leak, according to Moscow due to the impact of a micrometeorite.
The Russian agency has decided to send another spacecraft to its rescue, the Soyuz MS-23, which is scheduled to depart on February 24 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome.
Prior to this escape, the three men were due to arrive on Earth on March 28. “It is now scheduled to take place aboard Soyuz MS-23 in September 2023,” Roscosmos said in a statement on Tuesday.
Source: BFM TV
