Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Space
  3. News

SpaceX successfully launches four more astronauts to space station

Trevor Mogg
By
NASA Live: Official Stream of NASA TV

SpaceX has successfully launched four more astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS).

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying the Crew-2 astronauts inside the Crew Dragon spacecraft blasted off from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 5:49 a.m. ET on Friday, April 23. You can watch the liftoff in the video below.

Liftoff of Falcon 9 and Dragon! pic.twitter.com/g6Oi8qwU2Y

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) April 23, 2021

The crew — NASA astronauts Shane Kimbrough and Megan McArthur, plus Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Akihiko Hoshide, and European Space Agency astronaut Thomas Pesquet — are scheduled to dock with the ISS at 5:10 a.m. on Saturday, April 24. The entire event, including the astronauts’ entry into the space station, will be streamed live on NASA TV, which we’ve embedded at the top of this page.

The Crew-2 mission marks only the second operational flight of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule, and the third astronaut flight overall.

The capsule’s first-ever crewed flight took place in May 2020 with NASA astronauts Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken in the Demo-2 mission. The successful test flight paved the way for the first operational mission (Crew-1), which got underway in November 2020 with NASA’s Mike Hopkins, Victor Glover, and Shannon Walker, together with JAXA’s Soichi Noguchi. That crew will be returning to Earth in another Crew Dragon capsule next week, while the Crew-2 astronauts will spend the next six months aboard the orbiting outpost as part of the station’s Expedition 65.

Today’s launch was due to take place 24 hours earlier on Thursday, but adverse weather prompted SpaceX and NASA to hold off until better conditions prevailed.

Want to find out more about the Crew-2 astronauts currently hurtling toward the space station? Then check out this NASA video featuring each crew member answering a bunch of rapid-fire questions.

Editors' Recommendations

After SLS rocket flop, Space Coast visitors make do with SpaceX launch
Falcon 9
NASA inks deal for 2nd private astronaut mission to space station
The space station and Earth.
SpaceX Starlink internet heads to first cruise ships
Starlink internet dishes on a Royal Caribbean cruise ship.
How to watch SpaceX’s nighttime Starlink launch tonight
SpaceX rocket launch
Surreal NASA video makes Earth look like another world
An aurora seen from the space station.
NASA’s Webb telescope captures the majestic Tarantula Nebula
The Tarantula Nebula captured by the James Webb Space Telescope.
Space expert reveals Guinness World Records of the universe
A luminous active galactic nucleus known as a quasar.
NASA’s Mars helicopter takes longest flight since lengthy layoff
NASA's Ingenuity helicopter.
NASA reveals who will build new spacesuits for next lunar landing
An artist's illustration showing astronauts on the moon.
NASA’s DART spacecraft gets its first glimpse of target asteroid
Artist’s impression of the asteroid (234) Barbara.
NASA eyes two dates for third try at Artemis moon rocket launch
NASA's SLS rocket on the launchpad.
ISS astronaut talks space debris
The space station and Earth.
See the horror of the sun up close from world’s most powerful solar telescope
The first images of the chromosphere – the area of the Sun’s atmosphere above the surface – taken with the Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope on June 3rd, 2022. The image shows a region 82,500 kilometers across at a resolution of 18 km. This image is taken at 486.13 nanometers using the hydrogen-beta line from the Balmer series.