With Crew-13, Jessica Watkins became the first Black woman to lead a mission into space. A four-person crew launched from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida, aboard a Falcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon 'Grace' spacecraft at 11:10 am EDT Thursday, beginning a six-month expedition to the International Space Station. The launch was delayed from mid-September to replace a faulty valve in the Dragon’s propulsion system, requiring a surgical intervention to cut into a propellant line and swap the component.
Watkins, a 38-year-old geologist and veteran of a 170-day 2022 spaceflight, commands the crew, which includes Marine Corps pilot Luke Delaney, Canadian astronaut Joshua Kutryk, and Russian cosmonaut Sergey Teteryatnikov. Kutryk and his wife Heather are expecting their third child later this year. The crew achieved the fastest-ever US launch-to-docking transit to the ISS, reaching orbit eight hours after liftoff.
This marks SpaceX’s 13th crew rotation mission under its NASA contract and 21st human spaceflight overall, restoring U.S. independent crew launch capability after the Space Shuttle retirement.
Source: Ars Technica · Summarized by HeadlinesBriefing