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The US space agency NASA said on Tuesday it is now targeting the last week of April to send the Crew-4 astronauts to the International Space Station through Tesla Inc (NASDAQ: TSLA) CEO Elon Musk’s SpaceX.
What happened: The space companies are targeting the launch from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida no earlier than Saturday, April 23 at 5:26 a.m. ET.
The dates have been adjusted for the launch of SpaceX’s first 10-day, all-private Axiom Mission 1 (Ax-1) to the ISS on April 8.
The Crew-4 launch date has two backups: on Sunday, April 24 and Monday, April 25.
The mission will bring NASA astronauts Kjell Lindgren, Robert Hines, Jessica Watkins and European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti to the space station.
The astronauts will fly on a new Dragon spacecraft, called Freedom, on the reusable Falcon 9 rocket.
During the transfer mission, Crew-3 astronauts will splash down off the coast of Florida after a crew-4 transfer on the space station.
See also: Elon Musk’s SpaceX is going to launch the first completely private ISS mission on Friday with Axiom Space
Why it matters: Crew-4’s mission was originally scheduled to take place on April 19, but has been delayed due to the delay in Ax-1.
SpaceX launched its first private mission to the ISS last week without government-sponsored astronauts. The agency brought an all-civilian crew to Earth orbit last year on a three-day journey, without a stopover at the ISS.
SpaceX and NASA are working on multiple projects, including a $2.9 billion moon landing contract. Musk dreams of colonizing Mars and making life multiplanetary.
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This post SpaceX, NASA Target April End for Crew-4 ISS Launch
was original published at “https://www.benzinga.com/news/22/04/26606853/elon-musks-spacex-nasa-now-target-april-end-to-send-crew-4-astronauts-to-space”
