Spacecraft

The Crew Dragon Endeavour spacecraft departin hte International Space Station (Photo NASA)

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A few hours ago, SpaceX’s Crew Dragon Endeavour spacecraft ended its Crew-2, or SpaceX Crew-2, mission on behalf of NASA by splashing down without problems. Onboard were astronauts Thomas Pesquet, Megan McArthur, Shane Kimbrough, and Akihiko Hoshide, who reached the International Space Station on April 24, were part of the Expeditions 65 and 66. They finished SpaceX’s second regular crewed mission in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Pensacola, Florida. The Crew Dragon left the International Space Station about 8.5 hours earlier. Shortly after splashing down, the SpaceX ship called “Go Navigator” went to retrieve the Crew Dragon and its crew to transport them to the coast.

Progress MS-18 spacecraft blasted off atop a Soyuz-2.1a rocket (Image NASA TV)

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A few hours ago, the Progress MS-18 spacecraft blasted off atop a Soyuz-2.1a rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. After about nine minutes it successfully separated from the rocket’s last stage and was placed on its route. The cargo spacecraft began its resupply mission to the International Space Station also called Progress 79 or 79P. In this mission, the route used is the one that requires about two days.

The Soyuz MS-18 spacecraft landing (Image NASA TV)

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A few hours ago, cosmonaut Oleg Novitskiy, director Klim Shipenko and actress Yulia Peresild returned to Earth on the Soyuz MS-18 spacecraft, which landed in Kazakhstan. Novitskiy spent just over 6 months on the International Space Station, where he arrived on April 9, 2021, as part of Expedition 64. Shipenko and Peresild arrived on October 5, 2021, to shoot a film on the Station in an agreement with the space agency Roscosmos that changed the normal rotation of the Station crew.

The New Shepard rocket blasting off in its NS-18 flight (Image courtesy Blue Origin)

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Yesterday, Blue Origin conducted the second crewed flight of its New Shepard rocket, which included actor William Shatner, famous especially for playing James Kirk in the “Star Trek” saga. The rocket blasted off from the company’s spaceport in Van Horn, Texas, and after about 3 minutes the spacecraft named “RSS First Step” separated from the rocket and reached an altitude of about 107 kilometers, more than the 100 kilometers of the Kármán Line that officially marks the boundary with space. Both the single-stage rocket and the spacecraft are reusable, so both landed at the end of the flight.