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SpaceX, the private rocket company of billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk, was forced by bad weather to postpone Wednesday the planned launch of two Americans in orbit from Florida, a mission that will mark the first space flight of NASA astronauts from American soil in nine years.

The countdown was interrupted less than 17 minutes before the Kennedy Space Center’s SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket took off, propelling Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken on a 19-hour journey aboard the company’s new Crew Dragon capsule to the International space station.

The next launch window is scheduled for Saturday afternoon when SpaceX will try a second time to send the astronauts into orbit.

The scrubbed launch occurred on an intermittent rainy day over Florida, and the National Weather Service had issued a tornado warning for the region. Air operations directors were monitoring a number of worrisome weather conditions, including the threat of lightning, even when crews began loading the rocket with fuel.

At the time, Hurley, 53, and Behnken, 49, were already strapped to their Crew Dragon seats, after climbing an 80-meter (265-foot) tower to the access bridge to the capsule. at the top of the Falcon 9 Rocket.

A live NASA television program broadcast live on the Internet showed the two men seated and looking calm, side by side in their white flight suits, as the launch delay was announced.

President Donald Trump had previously flown on Air Force One in Florida and arrived in Cape Canaveral to observe the launch. Musk, Vice President Mike Pence and NASA chief Jim Bridenstine were also in attendance for the scheduled launch.

The astronauts were to take off from the same launch pad used in 2011 by the last flight of the NASA space shuttle, which was piloted by Hurley. Since then, NASA astronauts have had to hitch orbit aboard the Russian Soyuz spacecraft.

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