An international crew of four astronaus representing four countries have arrived at the International Space Station.
The Dragon spacecraft hatch was opened at 10:58 a.m. ET Sunday shortly after the station crew opened the hatch between the space station and the pressurized mating adapter.
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying the Dragon spacecraft wih American astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli, Danish astronaut Andreas Mogensen, Japanese astronaut Satoshi Furukawa, and Russian cosmonaut Konstantin Borisov on board reached th destination a day after launching from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
The SpaceX Crew-7 mission is the seventh commercial crew rotation mission for NASA.
Aboard the International Space Station, the crew will conduct more than 200 science experiments and technology demonstrations to prepare for missions to the Moon, Mars, and beyond, according to NASA.
“By partnering with countries around the world, NASA is engaging the best scientific minds to enable our bold missions, and it’s clear that we can do more – and we can learn more – when we work together,” said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson.
Crew-7 will join the space station’s Expedition 69 crew of NASA astronauts Stephen Bowen, Woody Hoburg, and Frank Rubio, as well as UAE’s first astronaut Sultan Alneyadi, and Roscosmos cosmonauts Sergey Prokopyev, Dmitri Petelin, and Andrey Fedyaev. For a short time, the number of crew aboard the space station will increase to 11 until Crew-6 members return to Earth a few days later.
Crew-7 will conduct new scientific research to benefit humanity on Earth and prepare for human exploration beyond low Earth orbit. Experiments include the collection of microbial samples from the exterior of the space station, the first study of human response to different spaceflight durations, and an investigation of the physiological aspects of astronauts’ sleep.
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