SpaceX is ready to launch the 21st NASA Commercial Resupply Services (CRS-21) mission to the International Space Station (ISS). An upgraded version of the Dragon spacecraft will carry over 6,400 pounds of essential equipment and supplies to the orbiting laboratory. SpaceX initially aimed to conduct the CRS-21 mission on Saturday, December 5th, but unfavorable weather conductions prompted a delay. –“Due to poor weather in the recovery area for today’s attempt, now targeting Sunday, December 6 at 11:17 a.m. EST for launch of CRS-21,” SpaceX wrote announced this morning. Weather conditions need to be stable in order to recover the Falcon 9’s first-stage booster. The company recovers the first-stage by performing a propulsive landing on autonomous droneships at sea. SpaceX is the only company in the world capable of returning and reusing orbital-class rocket boosters.
Launch Update 🚀 @NASA and @SpaceX are now targeting Sunday, Dec. 6 at 11:17 a.m. ET for the 21st Commercial Resupply Services mission to the @Space_Station.
— NASA's Kennedy Space Center (@NASAKennedy) December 5, 2020
Live coverage will begin tomorrow at 10:45 a.m. ET on NASA TV: https://t.co/1XQVlkaW6V https://t.co/sBAU4NzrSN
Dragon will be launched to low Earth orbit atop a historic thrice flown Falcon 9 booster, identified by the company as booster number B1058. SpaceX plans to recover the booster a fourth time to reuse on a future mission. The historic rocket booster previously launched a pair of NASA astronauts during SpaceX’s Demo-2 mission in May; It was the company’s first crewed flight to the orbiting laboratory that returned human spaceflight capabilities to the United States. B1058 was recovered soon after Demo-2 and performed the ANASIS-II mission for South Korea in July, also deployed the thirteenth fleet of Starlink satellites in October. SpaceX engineers aim to reuse a particular first-stage booster at least 10 times to significantly reduce the cost of spaceflight.
When the CRS-21 Dragon capsule arrives to the Space Station there will be two SpaceX spacecraft docked to the ISS Harmony module for the first time in history. The Crew Dragon Resilience spacecraft that ferried Crew-1 astronauts to the station in November is currently docked. If the CRS-21 mission lifts off on Sunday, December 6 at 11:17 a.m. EST, Dragon would dock to ISS by Monday, December 7. The agency will Livestream the mission in the video below starting at 10:45 a.m. EST tomorrow.
Featured Image Source: NASA
About the Author
Evelyn Arevalo
Evelyn J. Arevalo joined Tesmanian in 2019 to cover news as a Space Journalist and SpaceX Starbase Texas Correspondent. Evelyn is specialized in rocketry and space exploration. The main topics she covers are SpaceX and NASA.
