Follow live the flight of the rescue capsule which will bring back the 2 “castaway” astronauts from the ISS

Weather conditions in Florida still remain uncertain. Forecasts suggest that takeoff has a one in two chance of occurring, according to a situation update made on September 26. The main concern, according to NASA, lies in the ascent phase of the Falcon 9 launcher. A postponement cannot be ruled out.

The SpaceX Crew 9 mission in summary

• Quoi ? A SpaceX mission which will send a crew to the ISS;
• When ? Saturday, September 28, at 7:17 p.m. (Paris time);
• Or ? At the Kennedy Space Center (Florida);
• What verra-t-on? Takeoff of the launcher in the USA, sending the capsule into orbit for a period of five days, a spacewalk and return to Earth.

How to see the Falcon 9 rocket take off?

NASA and SpaceX will provide live broadcast of the flight.

What is SpaceX looking to accomplish?

The goal is to propel a Crew Dragon manned capsule into space and dock it with the ISS, which is 400 km above Earth. For once, the crew will only be made up of two people: the American Nick Hague and the Russian Alexandre Gorbounov. The other two seats are left vacant.

This is no surprise: the Crew Dragon capsule must also serve as an “escape capsule” for Barry Wilmore and Sunita Williams, the two American astronauts who involuntarily became “castaways” from space. Indeed, they participated in the Boe-CFT mission, with Boeing’s Starliner capsule, but things went wrong.

Barry Wilmore and Sunita Williams were initially only supposed to stay on the ISS for a short week. Ultimately, they will only return to Earth in a little less than four months. The Starliner capsule finally made its return to Earth, despite persistent concerns about its reliability. A victory for Boeing, despite the absence of the crew on return.

When does the Falcon 9 rocket take off?

The American space agency plans to launch the Falcon 9 rocket on September 28, at 7:17 p.m. (Paris time). Initially, it was planned to launch the mission on the 26th, but the American space agency had to take into account a tropical cyclone located too close to the Gulf of Mexico and the coast of Florida.

It is not impossible that a new delay will take place, after an initial postponement of two days. On a technical level, everyone is ready for D-Day: the dress rehearsal has been done and the static firing of the engines has been completed.