Four astronauts blast off to International Space Station on SpaceX rocket

Four astronauts have blasted off to the International Space Station for a six-month stint in orbit.

SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket launched from the Kennedy Space Centre at Cape Canaveral in Florida on Sunday, carrying NASA’s Matthew Dominick, Michael Barratt, Jeanette Epps, and Russia’s Alexander Grebenkin.

Footage confirmed the rocket’s 9 Merlin engines roaring into life because it ascended from the launch tower.

The astronauts ought to dock with the orbiting lab some 250 miles (420km) above Earth on Tuesday after a 16-hour flight.

The crew will perform about 250 experiments within the orbital platform’s microgravity setting.

They will exchange a crew from the US, Denmark, Japan and Russia, who’ve been there since August.

“When are you getting here already?” area station commander Andreas Mogensen requested through X after three days of delay on account of excessive wind.

There was nearly one other postponement on Sunday evening after a small crack within the seal of the SpaceX capsule’s hatch prompted a last-minute flurry of evaluations, nevertheless it was deemed secure for the entire mission.

It is the eighth long-duration group NASA has flown aboard a SpaceX launch automobile for the reason that non-public rocket enterprise, based in 2002 by billionaire Elon Musk, started sending US astronauts to orbit in May 2020.

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The new crew’s keep consists of the arrival of two different rocketships ordered by NASA.

Boeing’s new Starliner capsule with check pilots is due in late April.

Sierra Space’s Dream Chaser, a mini-shuttle, ought to arrive a month or two later and can ship cargo however not passengers to the station.