A SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft successfully rendezvoused with the International Space Station early Tuesday following a 28-hour orbital pursuit, bringing three NASA astronauts and a Russian cosmonaut to the station for a six-month mission.
The docking marked the culmination of a particularly eventful period for SpaceX, which included the launch of the Crew Dragon on Sunday at 10:53 p.m. EST, followed by consecutive Falcon 9 flights on Monday from Florida and California, deploying a total of 76 satellites into orbit.
Throughout these activities, the Crew Dragon launched three days later than planned due to high winds, steadily closing in on the space station, aligning from behind and below before docking at the Harmony module’s forward port at 2:28 a.m. EST Tuesday, approximately 30 minutes ahead of schedule.
Once securely attached, a SpaceX flight controller confirmed the completion of the docking sequence. In a playful exchange, the controller noted the early arrival, quipping about not being “Crew L8.” Commander Matthew Dominick of Crew 8 responded in kind, expressing excitement and gratitude towards the teams involved in the mission.
Dominick, along with space station veteran Mike Barratt, Jeanette Epps, and Russian cosmonaut Alexander Grebenkin, are relieving the previous Crew 7, led by commander Jasmin Moghbeli, European Space Agency astronaut Andreas Mogensen, Japanese astronaut Satoshi Furukawa, and cosmonaut Konstantin Borisov. They are scheduled to depart on March 11, concluding their six-month stint in space.
Following the docking, Moghbeli welcomed Crew 8 aboard, acknowledging the changes since their departure and expressing anticipation for their upcoming interactions.
After conducting leak checks to ensure a secure seal, the hatches were opened, allowing Crew 8 to float into the space station and be greeted by Moghbeli’s crew and other station members.
Crew 7 will spend nearly a week facilitating the transition for their replacements before returning to Earth. Meanwhile, the Soyuz spacecraft, which brought Kononenko, Chub, and O’Hara to the station last September, will see Novitskiy, Vasilevskaya, and Dyson arrive on March 21. On April 2, Novitskiy, Vasilevskaya, and O’Hara will return to Earth aboard the same Soyuz, with Dyson remaining aboard until September.