Africa-Press – Mauritius. WASHINGTON (Sputnik) – The world’s first all-private crew to the International Space Station (ISS) is returning back to Earth on board the SpaceX Dragon Endeavour spacecraft, SpaceX informs.
“Separation confirmed.
Dragon will now perform four burns to move away from the @space_station; will reenter the Earth’s atmosphere in ~16 hours with a targeted splashdown at approximately 1:06 p.
m. ET [17:06 GMT] on April 25,” SpaceX said on Twitter. According to live coverage from NASA, the separation has been confirmed and the Dragon spacecraft is returning back to Earth five days past the originally set return date.
Initially, SpaceX expected the splashdown to occur on April 19, but unfavorable weather conditions off the coast of Florida led to several postponements of the Ax-1 crew’s return.
The first all commercial crewed Axiom-1 mission to the ISS blasted off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral, Florida, on April 8. Initially, the mission was expected to last about 10 days.
Axiom Ax-1 crew members include Commander Michael Lopez-Alegria of the United States and Spain, pilot Larry Connor of the United States, mission specialist Eytan Stibbe of Israel and mission specialist Mark Pathy of Canada.
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