SpaceX

Official NASA’s SpaceX Crew-9 portrait: (L-R) Stephanie Wilson, Aleksandr Gorbunov, Nick Hague, and Zena Cardman.
Photo: NASA

NASA announced the four astronauts that will travel aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket to the International Space Station later this year: Zena Cardman will be the Mission Commander,  Nick Hague will be the Pilot, along with Stephanie Wilson and Russian Mission Specialist Aleksandr Gorbunov will travel to ISS no earlier than August 2024.

Zena Cardman

Zena Cardman
Photo: UNC Chapel Hill

Cardman will be making her first spaceflight on this mission. She is a Williamsburg, Virginia, native and holds a bachelor’s degree in Biology plus a master’s in Marine Sciences from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. While a doctoral candidate, Cardman researched geobiology and geochemical cycling in subsurface environments, from caves to deep-sea sediments. Since joining NASA, she has supported real-time ISS operations and development for lunar surface exploration.

Nick Hague

Nick Hague
Photo: NASA

For Hague, this mission will be his third launch and his second mission to ISS. During his first launch in 2018, Hague and his crewmate Roscosmos cosmonaut Alexey Ovchinin were aboard Soyuz MS-10 when they experienced a booster failure resulting in an in-flight launch abort. The spacecraft landed safely with no serious injuries. Resiliently, only five months later, Hague launched aboard Soyuz MS-12 and served as a flight engineer aboard the space station during Expeditions 59 and 60. He has spent 203 days in space and has conducted three spacewalks as part of his duties aboard ISS.

Soyuz MS-10 breaking up above Kazakhstan with Nick Hague abord. The launch abort system can be seen firing, bottom center.
Photo: NASA

Stephanie Wilson

Stephanie Wilson
Photo: NASA

Wilson has spent 42 days in space aboard three separate space shuttle Discovery missions, STS-121, STS-120, and STS-131. A graduate of  Engineering Science from Harvard University, she also earned a master’s degree in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Texas in Austin. Wilson has been with NASA for 29 years and has served as the integration branch chief for NASA’s Astronaut Office, focusing on International Space Station systems and payload operations. She also served as the acting chief of NASA’s Program and Project Integration Office at the agency’s Glenn Research Center in Cleveland.

As the ground fills with smoke and steam, Space Shuttle Discovery creates its own fireworks display, fitting for the first ever launch on Independence Day. It was the third launch attempt in four days; the others were scrubbed due to weather concerns. Liftoff on mission STS-121 was on-time at 2:38 p.m. EDT. During the 12-day mission, the STS-121 crew of seven will test new equipment and procedures to improve shuttle safety, deliver supplies and make repairs to the International Space Station. Landing is scheduled for July 16 or 17 at Kennedy’s Shuttle Landing Facility.
Photo: NASA/Nikon/Scott Andrews
Aleksandr Gorbunov
Photo: Roscosmos

Aleksandr Gorbunov

The mission will be Gorbunov’s first trip to space and the station. Hailing from Zheleznogorsk, in south-central Russia, he studied engineering with qualifications in spacecraft and upper stages from the Moscow Aviation Institute. Gorbunov graduated from the military department with a specialty in operating and repairing aircraft, helicopters, and aircraft engines.  He previously worked for engineer for Rocket Space Corporation Energia and since joining the Russian cosmonaut corps, he has supported Russian cargo missions to ISS.

This will be the ninth rotational mission to the space station under NASA’s Commercial Crew Program.

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SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 carrying the Northrup Grumman NG-20 mission towards ISS this afternoon. The launch was at 12:07 PM EST from the company’s launch pad at SLC-40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, and once it had completed its part of the mission, Booster 1077 completed its tenth flight when it safely touched down at Landing Zone 1, about 5.6 miles to the south of where it launched a little more than eight minutes earlier.

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SpaceX Falcon 9 carrying Northrup Grumman NG-20 Cygnus launches from Pad SLC-40 at Cape Canaveral on January 30, 2024
Photo: Charles Boyer / Talk of Titusville

SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 carrying the Northrup Grumman NG-20 mission towards ISS this afternoon. The launch was at 12:07 PM EST from the company’s launch pad at SLC-40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, and once it had completed its part of the mission, Booster 1077 completed its tenth flight when it safely touched down at Landing Zone 1, about 5.6 miles to the south of where it launched a little more than eight minutes earlier.

A previous Cygnus space craft in the grasp of ISS’s Canadarm2.
Photo: NASA

Today’s launch was the first of three that Northrup Grumman has contracted with SpaceX, and is the twentieth ISS resupply mission that the company has flown. According to NASA, the Cygnus cargo spacecraft is carrying 3,017 pounds of experiments, 2,493 pounds of hardware, 2,490 pounds of crew supplies, 149 pounds of computer resources and 35 pounds of spacewalk equipment.

SpaceX Performs Late-Load For First Time

Some of that cargo was loaded in the past 24 hours — foodstuffs (ice cream for the astronauts is rumored to be that portion of the payload) as well as some of the materials for science experiments required a “late-load,” which is a new capability for SpaceX that necessitated a one-delay from the initial planned launch date of January 29.

“We’re going to do a late-load activity into the Cygnus vehicle [so] we modified the fairing that’s the covering that goes on the outside of the Falcon rocket to include a 5-foot by 4-foot wide door. It essentially allows us to enter into the fairing area and put late-load car cargo in,” William Gerstenmaier, SpaceX’s vice president ofBuild and Flight Reliability, said in a news conference on January 26th.

Booster B1077 descending towards its landing on Tuesday January 30, 2024
Photo: Charles Boyer / Talk of Titusville

Cygnus is expected to arrive at the International Space Station, where it will be docked to the orbiting facility’s Unity module by astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli.

Arrival At Space Station Will Be On Thursday

Now in orbit, the Cygnus cargo spacecraft will arrive at the International astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli will grapple it using ISS’s Canadarm 2 robotic arm, and the crew will then dock Cygnus to the Unity module. Following some normal checkouts, later, astronauts will then open the hatch to Cygnus and will begin to unload the cargo within the spacecraft.

The Cygus spacecraft is expected to stay at the International Space Station for up to six months. The spacecraft may perform additional services such as reboosting the station’s orbit to counteract atmospheric drag. Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus provides the only U.S. spacecraft reboost capability for the International Space Station.

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Liftoff As Seen Around The Space Coast

Click on the photo to see it full size on your device.

Falcon 9 in flight as it approaches the speed of sound. Photo: Richard Gallagher / Florida Media Now
Falcon 9 lifting off from SLC-40 in Cape Canaveral. Photo: Charles Boyer / Talk of Titusville
A vapor cone at the top of Falcon 9 caused by adiabatic cooling. Photo: Richard Gallagher / Florida Media Now
Liftoff of Falcon 9 as seen from the NASA Press Site. Photo: Richard Gallagher, Florida Media Now
A “light-saber” timelapse of Falcon 9’s liftoff. Photo: Chris Leymarie, Florida Media Now
Falcon 9 touching down at Landing Zone 1. Photo: Ed Cordero, Florida Media Now
Falcon 9 lifts off, as seen from the NASA Press Site. Photo: Charles Boyer, Talk of Titusville
Booster 1077 descending towards landing, as seen from NASA Press Site. Photo: Charles Boyer, Talk of Titusville
Falcon 9 lifts off. As seen from SLC-40, Charles Boyer, Talk of Titusville
Falcon 9 lifts off. As seen from KARS Park. Photo: Ed Cordero, Florida Media Now
Booster 1077 descending in freefall. Photo: Ed Cordero, Florida Media Now
Booster 1077’s landing burn at LZ-1. Photo: Ed Cordero, Florida Media Now
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A Northrup Grumman Cygnus at the International Space Station
Photo courtesy of Northrup Grumman

On Monday, January 29th, update: Tuesday, January 30th SpaceX will launch Northrup-Grumman’s Cygnus CRS-2 towards the International Space Station aboard a Falcon 9. This launch will be the 20th resupply mission carried out as part of NG’s Commercial Resupply contract with NASA, and will ferry supplies for the station’s crew, equipment, as well as new scientific experiments to the orbiting outpost.

The launch is scheduled for 12:07 PM EST with an instantaneous window from Cape Canaveral’s SLC-40. Approximately eight minutes after launching, the booster used for this mission will return to the Cape to land at LZ-1, SpaceX’s landing facility located about 5.6 miles to the south of the launch pad.

The Northrop Grumman Cygnus spacecraft’s pressurized cargo module (PCM) for the company’s 20th commercial resupply mission is lifted and moved by crane inside the high bay in the Space Station Processing Facility at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Monday, Sept. 18, 2023.
Photo: NASA

With a capacity of about 5,000 kg, Cygnus is a pressurized multi-purpose logistics module with about 36 cubic meters of interior volume that can be loaded with supplies. Cygnus is compatible with multiple launch vehicles including Northrop Grumman’s Antares 330 and Medium Launch Vehicle (MLV) currently in development, and has launched on ULA’s Atlas V, Antares vehicles and SpaceX’s Falcon 9. The module is also capable of reboosting the ISS to a higher orbit, but it is not known at this time if that capability will be utilized by NG-20.

Experiments Aboard NG-20

NASA released information regarding the experiments that will be aboard Cygnus for ISS astronauts to perform:

NASA’s Biological and Physical Sciences Division (BPS) is sending three experiments and equipment on this mission:

  1. MABL-A, Role of Mesenchymal Stem Cells in Microgravity Induced Bone Loss, Part A: This experiment aims to study the role of mesenchymal stem cells in microgravity-induced bone loss. The results could provide a better understanding of the basic molecular mechanisms of bone loss caused by spaceflight and normal aging on Earth.
  2. APEX-10, Advanced Plant Experiment-10: This experiment will study plant-microbe interactions in space, which may support steps to optimize these beneficial interactions to increase plant productivity on Earth as well as in space.
  3. BRIC-25, Biological Research in Canisters-25: This experiment studies how microgravity affects Staphylococcus aureus, a common and concerning bacterium. The knowledge gained from this experiment could not only safeguard astronauts’ health but also improve our understanding of bacterial adaptations on Earth.

Flight Trajectory

The flight trajectory for the NG-20 mission is to the northeast. The booster will travel southwest to return to the landing zone at Cape Canaveral.

Booster 1077 History

Booster B1077 will fly its tenth mission for this flight. B1077 has successfully completed nine previous launches and landings, and was first used for the Crew-5 mission.

FlightMissionDate
1Crew-510/15/2023
2GPS III SV0601/18/2023
3 Inmarsat-6 F202/18/2023
4Starlink Group 5-1003/29/2023
5Dragon CRS-2 SpX-2806/05/2023
6Galaxy 3708/03/2023
7Starlink Group 6-1309/01/2023
8Starlink Group 6-2510/30/2023
9Starlink Group 6-3312/07/2023
Booster 1077 flight record

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Crew Dragon atop a Falcon 9 at Pad LC-39A at Kennedy Space Center on January 17, 2024.
Photo by Charles Boyer, Talk of Titusville.

With about six hours left in the countdown to liftoff, SpaceX announced that they are canceling today’s planned launch of Falcon 9 carrying four astronauts to orbit aboard a Crew Dragon to the International Space Station. The mission on behalf of Axiom Space is dubbed Axiom-3 and will now launch NET Thursday, January 18, 2024 at 4:47 PM EST.

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Astronauts Alper Gezeravcı, Marcus Wandt, Michael López-Alegría, Walter Villadei examining their ride to space, a Falcon 9, in September 2024
Photo courtesy of Axiom Space

The 45th Weather Squadron has released its official Launch Mission Execution Forecast for tomorrow’s planned crewed launch of Axiom-3 by SpaceX. According to forecasters, there is less than a 5% Probability of Violation of weather conditions, meaning the weather is expected to be almost perfect, especially by Florida standards: they expect a 95% or greater chance of acceptable weather conditions. The launch is planned for 5:11 PM EST. Once in orbit, the astronauts will travel to the International Space Station for an anticipated 14-day stay.

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SpaceX Falcon 9 lifts off with the Starlink 6-37 mission aboard. It’s destination is low-Earth orbit where 23 satellites will be placed in the Starlink constellation.
Photo: Charles Boyer / Talk of Titusville

SpaceX sent another batch of 23 Starlink satellites for their orbital-based Internet service tonight from Cape Canaveral aboard a Falcon 9 booster. The mission was designated Starlink 6-37, part of Group 6 of Starlink satellites providing global Internet connectivity to the company’s customers.

Liftoff was shortly after 8:52 pm EST from Pad SLC-40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. Tonight’s re-useable booster was B1071 making its 12th flight. Roughly eight and a half minutes after liftoff, B1071 touched down safely near the Bahamas on a droneship in the Atlantic Ocean.

The second stage continued to carry the company’s payload to orbit, which it achieved successfully at about the same time the first stage booster was touching down. Shortly afterward, the Starlink satellites were deployed and the launch was deemed a success by mission managers.

Clouds cleared sufficiently that many in the Space Coast had a spectacular view of Falcon 9 as it ascended from Cape Canaveral. This was the view from an Orlando neighborhood.
Photo: Ed Cordero, Florida Media Now

Mission Trajectory

Tonight’s launch was to the southeast, as has been customary with other launches of the Group 6 batch of Starlink satellites.

Mission trajectory for Starlink 6-37. Graphic via flightclub.io and annotated by Charles Boyer.
Mission trajectory for Starlink 6-37.
Graphic via flightclub.io and annotated by Charles Boyer.

16th Flight for Booster B-1076

This was the 12th flight for the first stage booster supporting this mission is B1071. The booster previously launched SES-22, ispace’s HAKUTO-R Mission 1, Hispasat Amazonas Nexus mission, CRS-27, and seven Starlink missions.

Following stage separation, the first stage landed on the autonomous spaceport drone ship (ASDS) A Shortfall of Gravitas droneship, stationed in the Atlantic Ocean northeast of the Bahamas.

The booster will be returned to Port Canaveral and then transferred to SpaceX’s Hangar X facility at Kennedy Space Center for inspection and ostensibly refurbishment for another flight on a future mission.

Next Launch

Axiom-3, a crewed launch planned to ferry four astronauts to the International Space Station aboard a Falcon 9.

Axiom-3 Flight Patch
Image courtesy: Axiom Space

The mission will be the first to carry and all-European crew to the International Space Station. It will be the third crewed mission to the International Space Station coordinated by Axiom Space.

Ax-3 will be the first all-European commercial astronaut mission to the ISS. It will also be the first commercial spaceflight mission made up of government and European Space Agency-sponsored astronauts flying on behalf of their nation.

The launch date is NET Wednesday January 17, 2024 at 5:11 PM EST from Pad LC-39A at Kennedy Space Center.

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A Starlink launch in September 2023.
Photo: Charles Boyer / Talk of Titusville

SpaceX plans to launch another batch of Starlink satellites aboard a Falcon 9 to its LEO Internet service constellation on Saturday, January 13, 2024. The launch window opens at 7:52 PM EST and closes early Sunday at 12:23 AM. The launch will be from Pad SLC-40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. Weather is a slight concern for the launch as a warm front pushes storms through the area today.

Trajectory

Southeast, as has been customary for Starlink’s Group 6 launches.

Weather

One day before launch, the 45th Space Wing forecasts a 70% chance of acceptable weather, with a 30% Probability of Violation that would force a scrub.

As always, it bears keeping in mind that a rocket launch can be scrubbed (canceled) up to and including the final minute of the countdown. Those scrubs may result from weather violations, intrusion into the excluded areas beneath the planned flight path or technical issues that arise during the countdown. Stay tuned to launch coverage for up-to-date information.

Launch Coverage

SpaceX will begin live-streaming the launch on their X account about five minutes before liftoff.

Spaceflight Now usually begins their live coverage about one hour prior to liftoff on their YouTube channel.

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A SpaceX Falcon 9 carrying the Starling 6-35 mission launches from Pad SLC-40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on January 7, 2024
Photo: Charles Boyer, Talk 0f Titusville

SpaceX sent the next batch of 23 Starlink satellites for their orbital-based Internet service tonight from Cape Canaveral aboard a Falcon 9 booster. Liftoff was shortly after 5:35 pm EST from Pad SLC-40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. Roughly eight and a half minutes after liftoff, the booster used for the flight touched down safely near the Bahamas. The second stage continued to carry the company’s payload to orbit, which it achieved successfully at about the same time the first stage booster was touching down.

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