American astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley flew Saturday from the Kennedy space center in Florida aboard a SpaceX rocket, the first private company to be entrusted by NASA with the responsibility of transporting its precious astronauts.
Taking advantage of a clearing, a rocket from the company founded by Elon Musk took off at 3:22 p.m. (9:22 p.m. Swiss time) and placed the Crew Dragon capsule in orbit unhindered about ten minutes later, for its first manned flight, and the first launched by the United States since 2011.
After completing its task of pulling the two men from Earth’s gravity, the first stage of the 70-meter rocket separated as expected and returned to land, vertically, on a barge off Florida – SpaceX is the only company in the world to recover its launchers in this way.
Then the second stage of Falcon 9 placed Dragon on the right orbit, in the direction of the International Space Station, which flies at more than 400 km above the oceans, at more than 27,000 km / h.
In doing so, a camera broadcast the interior of the capsule live, showing the two men strapped into their seats during their supersonic ascent.
‘Dragon separation confirmed,’ announced the launch director.
“Congratulations (…) on this first manned trip for Falcon 9, it was incredible,” said astronaut Doug Hurley, commander of the ship while Dragon was already traveling at 27,000 km / h, at around 200 km altitude.
The two men will reach the ISS on Sunday at 4:29 p.m. (Swiss time).
President Donald Trump attended the launch in person a few miles away, and will deliver a speech at the Kennedy Center at 5:00 p.m. (11:00 p.m. Swiss time).
“Real geniuses, nobody does that like us,” he said, saying that America’s prowess in space would be “one of the most important things we have ever done.”
/ ATS
– .
