The Crew Dragon capsule of the Crew-9 mission successfully docked with the International Space Station this Sunday, with astronauts Nick Hague and Aleksandr Gorbunov on board… as well as two empty seats. These two places are in fact reserved for their two colleagues Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore, stuck on board the station since this summer.
The latter arrived on site on June 5 aboard the famous Boeing Starliner capsule, in an already worrying context. Before takeoff, this machine suffered from problematic helium leaks, to say the least, which Boeing brushed aside… and the problems continued after firing. Four additional leaks were identified, and five of its auxiliary thrusters also encountered difficulties during the flight, forcing Wilmore and Williams to control the vehicle manually for more than an hour.
Fortunately, they arrived safely the next day — but they were not at the end of their surprises. Before repatriating them, NASA and Boeing first had to identify the origin of the Starliner’s problems, and the two partners had all the difficulty in the world to achieve this. The astronauts’ stay was supposed to last a long week: but in a context where Boeing could not guarantee the safety of their shuttle, they ultimately stayed stuck on board the station while the Starliner returned to Earth alone for further analysis.
Five months of science on the program
Since then, the two friends have been champing at the bit at an altitude of 400 km while waiting for another machine to come and pick them up. The arrival of the Crew Dragon, a machine significantly more reliable than that of Boeing, is therefore good news. But the mission Crew-9 is not going to immediately turn around; she will spend no less than five months aboard the ISS. Therefore, Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore will still have to be patient, because they will not return to dry land until next February.
The good news is that they will have plenty to do during this time. Until the arrival of the Crew Dragon, these two veterans had already integrated without flinching into the operational routine of the station, and they will continue to make themselves useful over the coming months. From now on, they will recover the responsibilities that were initially assigned to Stéphanie Wilson and Zena Cardman, the last two astronauts of the Crew-9 mission who had to give up their places to offer a return ticket to the two Ws.
More specifically, the reconstituted quartet will conduct several scientific experiments, particularly on human health. For example, they will study a variant of vitamin B which could reduce the effects of SANS (Spaceflight-Associated Neuro-ocular Syndrome). This is a vision disorder that tends to affect astronauts during long stays in orbit.
There will also be physics and plant biology on the menu. The Crew-9 crew will work on supernovas, these cataclysmic explosions that occur at the end of the life of certain stars, and explore the effects of different substances on the plants grown on board the station. In total, they will have to complete approximately 200 different experiences before their return in February 2025; so they won’t have time to get bored.
Failed return for the Falcon 9
By the way, this also applies to SpaceX engineers, because the mission that sent the Dragon to the ISS did not entirely go as planned. Even if the capsule arrived at its destination without any problem, the Falcon 9 which was responsible for deploying it into orbit had problems. The upper stage experienced a malfunction during the deorbit maneuver; it finished its course in the ocean as planned, but it arrived outside the targeted area. Therefore, Elon Musk’s firm took precautions. On Twitter/X, the company hinted that it would suspend Falcon 9 rocket launches until the origin of this anomaly is clarified.
After today’s successful launch of Crew-9, Falcon 9’s second stage was disposed in the ocean as planned, but experienced an off-nominal deorbit burn. As a result, the second stage safely landed in the ocean, but outside of the targeted area.
We will resume launching after we…
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) September 29, 2024
It will be interesting to see if the FAA, the American agency which regulates air traffic, will react to this incident, in a context of recurring frictions with SpaceX. As a reminder, the company is still waiting for the green light from the institution to proceed with the fifth test flight of its immense Starship. A stagnation of administrative origin which has the gift of exasperating Elon Musk, so much so that the latter recently announced his intention to launch legal action against the agency.
Source: www.journaldugeek.com
