SpaceX sent its first space tourists to the ISS
(SpaceX)
SpaceX launched the Crew Dragon spacecraft with four space tourists to the ISS.
They will arrive at the station on Saturday, April 9 and spend eight days there, after which they will return to Earth.
This is the first mission in which tourists will fly to the ISS in a non-Russian ship.
The first space tourist was the businessman Dennis Tito. He went to the ISS on a Russian Soyuz in 2001, along with two Russian professional cosmonauts.
After spending almost eight days in space, he returned to Earth with a different crew.
Then Roscosmos conducted seven more such flights, the last of which took place in 2009, after which tourist flights into space ceased for a long time.
After the start of Crew Dragon flights, space tourism resumed, SpaceX and Roscosmos are engaged in it.
SpaceX's first private mission took place in September 2021, and the company has several more contracts for future tourist flights.
At the end of last year, Roscosmos twice sent a partially civilian crew to the station: Japanese tourists and a Russian film crew.
And next year, the Russian space agency is even going to release a tourist into outer space.
Crew Dragon's first tourist flight took place without docking with the ISS, and now the ship has sent space tourists to the station for the first time.
It is worth noting that one of the crew members - Michael Lopez-Alegria - flies into space for the fifth time, but now not in the status of an astronaut and not on assignment from NASA.
The Falcon 9 rocket with the ship was launched from the spaceport at Cape Canaveral at 10:17 local time.
This is the fifth flight for the first stage of the rocket, and the third for the Crew Dargon capsule; it was also used during the first manned flight of Crew Dragon in 2020.
The first stage of the Falcon 9, after almost 10 minutes of flight, landed on the sea platform, and after another two and a half minutes the ship undocked from the second stage and continued flying.
The journey to the ISS will take a day and a half and it will docki with the American Harmony module.
After arriving, the tourists will spend a little over a week at the station and return to Earth on April 18.
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