NASA delays SpaceX Crew-1 launch until Sunday

Washington, Nov 14 (IANS) NASA and SpaceX are now targeting Sunday for the launch of the Crew-1 mission to the International Space Station (ISS) due to onshore winds and first stage booster recovery readiness.

The Crew-1 flight was earlier scheduled to launch on a Falcon 9 on Saturday at 7.49 p.m. EST from Launch Complex 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center.

The decision to delay the launch was taken after teams completed the final major review for the mission on Friday.

Crew-1 is the first crew rotation flight of a US commercial spacecraft with astronauts to the space station following the spacecraft system's official human rating certification.

After the review, NASA and SpaceX agreed to target the launch for 7.27 p.m. EST on Sunday.

The mission will take NASA astronauts Michael Hopkins, Victor Glover, and Shannon Walker, and astronaut Soichi Noguchi of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) to the space station for six months in the Crew Dragon spacecraft, which will launch on the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Launch Complex 39A.

The Crew Dragon is scheduled to dock to the space station at about 11 p.m. on Monday, NASA said.

--IANS

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