SpaceX capsule bringing crew to Space Station

152 views | Mar 03, 2023, 12:15:59 AM | AP
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SpaceX launched four astronauts to the International Space Station for NASA on Thursday. The Falcon rocket bolted from Kennedy Space Center shortly after midnight, with two Americans, one Russian and one astronaut from the United Arab Emirates on board. Nearly 80 spectators from the United Arab Emirates watched from the launch site as astronaut Sultan al-Neyadi — only the second Emirati to fly to space — blasted off on his six-month mission. Half a world away in Dubai and elsewhere across the UAE, schools and offices broadcast the launch live. Also riding the Dragon capsule that's due at the space station on Friday: NASA’s Stephen Bowen, a retired Navy submariner who logged three space shuttle flights, and Warren “Woody” Hoburg, a former research scientist at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and space newbie, and Andrei Fedyaev, a space rookie who’s retired from the Russian Air Force. The first attempt to launch them was called off Monday at the last minute because of a clogged filter in the engine ignition system. NASA and SpaceX officials at a news conference said the launch went very smoothly. The space station newcomers will replace a U.S.-Russian-Japanese crew that has been up there since October. The other station residents are two Russians and an American whose six-month stay was doubled, until September, after their Soyuz capsule sprang a leak. A replacement Soyuz arrived last weekend.