Yesterday, in the American afternoon, SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft ended its CRS-24 (Cargo Resupply Service 24) mission for NASA splashing down smoothly in the Gulf of Mexico, near Panama City. The Dragon left the International Space Station last Sunday. For SpaceX, this was the 4th mission of the 2nd contract with NASA to transport supplies to the Station with the new version of the Dragon cargo spacecraft, which splashes down near the East coast of the USA instead of the Pacific Ocean.

Shortly after the splashdown, SpaceX’s “Go Searcher” recovery ship went to retrieve the Dragon to transport it to the coast. The cargo brought back to Earth will be delivered to NASA within a few hours. The Dragon spacecraft reached the International Space Station on December 22, 2021.

The Dragon spacecraft brought back to Earth about 2,200 kg (about 4,900 lbs) of mixed cargo that include various scientific experiments and biological samples. Part of the samples is contained in the freezers because they need to be kept at low temperatures. The new version of the Dragon space freighter has twice the capacity to transport samples to Earth as the first version.

Other cargoes brought back to Earth are the LMM microscope and a spacesuit. LMM (Light Microscopy Module) finished its job started in 2009 on the International Space Station, where it was used in a lot of research directly by the crew and indirectly by scientists on Earth who were sent the images it could capture. The spacesuit is of the type used for spacewalks and will be refurbished.

SpaceX is the only American company that has a spacecraft capable of bringing intact cargo back to Earth so the Dragon missions are really important for NASA. Samples produced during many of the experiments conducted on the International Space Station may require in-depth analyzes possible only in specialized laboratories on Earth. The cargoes are delivered to NASA within no more than 9 hours.

The next Resupply mission for the space freighter Dragon could begin in May 2022 but that’s a tentative schedule. The new version of this spacecraft is passing all the tests regarding its reuse, so SpaceX and NASA engineers will consider whether to use one for its third mission.