Author: Stephen Johnson / Source: Big Think
- Crew Dragon has successfully completed its six-day mission designed to test whether the capsule is fit to transport humans to the ISS.
- SpaceX and NASA collaborated on the mission, which signals an end of U.S. reliance on Russian spacecraft to transport astronauts to the space station.
- Boeing also is working with NASA to execute missions to the space station, and plans to conduct similar tests in the coming months.
SpaceX’s commercial astronaut capsule, the Crew Dragon, successfully landed in the Atlantic Ocean Friday morning after being docked at the International Space Station for the past week.
It’s a historic achievement for SpaceX, which hopes to someday transport humans to space on the Crew Dragon, and also for NASA, which collaborated with SpaceX on the mission. The mission also signals an end to U.S. reliance on Russian spacecraft to transport astronauts to the ISS, since NASA retired the final Space Shuttle in 2011.
.@SpaceX’s recovery fast boats approached the #CrewDragon as it splashed down in the Atlantic Ocean. Up next, the t… https://t.co/fSlQJSlbmE
— NASA Commercial Crew (@Commercial_Crew)
In the final hours of Crew Dragon’s six-day test mission, the capsule detached from the ISS early Friday morning, burned thrusters to point itself toward the landing zone, endured a fiery re-entry through Earth’s atmosphere, and deployed parachutes to cushion its ocean landing, about 200 miles off the coast of Florida.
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