ISS space station is about to welcome two crews

Two crews are being prepared to fly to the International Space Station (ISS) in August and September after resolving technical issues.

Phi hành đoàn Dragon, Soyuz đang chuẩn bị bay lên ISS

From left: Crew-7 astronauts Konstantin Borisov, Andreas Mogensen, Jasmin Moghbeli and Satoshi Furukawa prepare to be launched to the International Space Station on August 17. (Source: SpaceX)

At a press conference on July 25, NASA officials said they are planning to prepare the Crew-7 crew to fly to the ISS on August 17. This mission, flown on the Crew Dragon spacecraft, was originally scheduled to launch on August 15, but was delayed by two days to allow more time to change the rocket from Falcon Heavy to Falcon 9.

At the time of the press conference, a Falcon Heavy rocket was scheduled to launch on July 26, carrying the Jupiter-3 communications satellite. That launch was also delayed by two days due to technical issues, but successfully lifted off on July 28.

Neither NASA nor SpaceX said whether the delay would affect the Crew-7 launch schedule. Steve Stich, NASA’s commercial crew program manager, said at the briefing that if Crew-7 does not launch by August 18, the only launch window before August 25 would be August 21.

Meanwhile, Mr. Benji Reed, Senior Director in charge of human spaceflight programs at SpaceX, affirmed that preparations for Crew-7 are going well.

The person revealed that during the Dragon cargo mission in June, an incident occurred when isolation valves in the spacecraft's propulsion system became stuck. Those valves, which are only used if there is a leak in the propulsion system, appeared to be corroded and remained open even though they were not needed.

"We are testing the isolation valves on all Dragon spacecraft. The valves on Crew-7 are functioning normally, as are the valves on Crew-6 that just docked to the ISS... We feel confident in Crew-7 going to the ISS," said Director Reed.

The Crew-7 crew will be commanded by NASA astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli, piloted by European Space Agency astronaut Andreas Mogensen. Members include Satoshi Furukawa of Japan's JAXA space agency and Konstantin Borisov of Roscosmos (Russia).

The four are expected to spend about 190 days on the station, said Joel Montalbano, NASA's ISS program manager.

This flight will be followed by the Soyuz MS-24 spacecraft, scheduled to launch on September 15. It will carry Roscosmos cosmonauts Oleg Kononenko and Nikolai Chub and NASA astronaut Loral O'Hara to the ISS.

Astronaut O'Hara is expected to spend six months on the ISS, while scientists Kononenko and Chub could stay up there for a year.

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