Four astronauts are on their way to the International Space Station (ISS). After several delays, the members of Crew-10 lifted off in a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft using a Falcon 9 rocket from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 7:03 p.m. ET on Saturday night. The crew includes NASA astronauts Anne McClain and Nichole Ayers, JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) astronaut Takuya Onishi, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Kirill Peskov.
“Congratulations to our NASA and SpaceX teams on the 10th crew rotation mission under our commercial crew partnership. This milestone demonstrates NASA’s continued commitment to advancing American leadership in space and driving growth in our national space economy,” said NASA acting Administrator Janet Petro. “Through these missions, we are laying the foundation for future exploration, from low Earth orbit to the Moon and Mars. Our international crew will contribute to innovative science research and technology development, delivering benefits to all humanity.”
You can rewatch the NASA livestream of the launch below:
The members of Crew-10 will replace the current Crew-9 on the ISS, including Starliner astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams. Wilmore and Williams were originally supposed to spend just over a week in space as part of the test of Boeing’s new Starliner spacecraft, but due to problems with the vehicle’s thrusters they ended up joining the ISS crew for nine months. Now, they — along with their other Crew-9 crew mates — will finally make the journey home.
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However, despite what some people have claimed, Wilmore and Williams have not been abandoned or forgotten about. The plan to bring them home with other Crew-9 astronauts has been in place for months, and was only somewhat delayed from the original intended departure of February due to issues with the SpaceX vehicle.
Now, with the impending arrival of Crew-10 at the ISS, there will be a short handover period and then the Crew-9 astronauts can return to Earth.
The Crew-10 astronauts are expected to arrive at the ISS tonight, March 15, at 11:30 p.m. ET. If you’d like to watch their Dragon arriving at the station, docking, and the astronauts being welcomed to their new home, then you can tune in via NASA’s streaming service, NASA+, with coverage beginning at 9:45 p.m. ET.