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Meet The Two Astronauts That Will Be Launched Into Space Later Today (PHOTOS)
See The Two Astronauts That Will Be Launched Into Space Later Today (PHOTOS)
Astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley are set to make history later today (May 27).
The duo will be piloting a test flight in a space shuttle called Crew Dragon spacecraft. The spacecraft that will be launched into space later today in a test flight.
SpaceX, a company owned by Elon Musk, owns the space shuttle – Crew Dragon spacecraft. The mission will be the company’s first ever-crewed flight.
The test flight will also be the first space launch from the United States since NASA grounded its space shuttle fleet in 2011. The test flight called Demo-2 is scheduled to launch at 4:33 p.m. EDT (2033 GMT) from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
The mission is designed to fully validate SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule and Falcon 9 rocket for human spaceflight.The success of the mission will commence the SpaceX ambition to start flying operational crewed missions for NASA.
SpaceX signed a $2.6 billion contract with NASA in 2014 to complete six such missions. The first of which will lift off shortly after Demo-2 lands, provided all goes well with the test flight.
NASA inked a similar, $4.2 billion deal at the same time with Boeing, which the aerospace giant will fulfil using its CST-100 Starliner capsule.
Tesla Model X That Will Be Used To Transport Astronauts
Astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley travelling for the first SpaceX crewed mission will arrive at the launchpad in a Tesla.
The launchpad for the space mission is at the NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
On June 2019, SpaceX launched its Falcon Heavy rocket, the world’s most powerful operational rocket, from Kennedy Space Center in Florida carrying 24 experimental satellites.
Inside one of these satellites, called the General Atomics Orbital Test Bed, are metal capsules, each containing the ashes of 152 deceased individuals.
SpaceX or Space Exploration Technologies Corp. is an aerospace manufacturer and space transportation services company. It has it’s headquartered in Hawthorne, California. It was founded in 2002. The goal of SpaceX is to reduce the cost of transportation to space.
