A breathtaking predawn launch at Cape Canaveral as SpaceX carries out its third astronaut mission in a year. Four astronauts are board, NASA’s Shane Kimbrough and Megan McArthur, French astronaut Thomas Pesquet and Japanese space flyer Akihiko Hoshide.
They're on their way! @Astro_Kimbrough, @Astro_Megan, @JAXA_en's @Aki_Hoshide, and @ESA's @Thom_Astro launched aboard their @SpaceX Crew Dragon at 5:49am ET this morning. Docking with the @Space_Station is at 5:10am ET, Sat., April 24: https://t.co/2IUIyZAJsp pic.twitter.com/1KLp5icpbK
— NASA (@NASA) April 23, 2021
Crew-2’s launch was one for the history books. It marked several firsts, including the first time that people have flown on a used Crew Dragon and with a used Falcon 9 first stage, and the first time that two different international astronauts have ridden in the capsule.
The Crew Dragon vehicle that launched this morning, known as Endeavour, also lifted off in May of 2020, carrying NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley to the ISS on the Demo-2 test flight, SpaceX’s first-ever crewed mission.
Dragon has separated from Falcon 9’s second stage and is on its way to the @space_station! Autonomous docking tomorrow at ~5:10 a.m. EDT pic.twitter.com/rg1QjZEl9u
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) April 23, 2021
After making it into orbit astronaut Shane Kimbrough radioed back, “Glad to be back in space for all of us.”
Watch more above from NBC’s Today show.
