NASA Schedules First Manned Flight From US Since Space Shuttle Atlantis Retired Nearly A Decade Ago

NASA announced Friday its first manned launch in nearly a decade from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida: a May 27 mission in conjunction to the International Space Station designed to see how SpaceX’s Crew Dragan capsule handles in space. The capsule is to be manned by Air Force Cols. Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley.

The mission was described only as an extended stay with no definite return date for splashdown in the Atlantic off Florida.

“A new era of human spaceflight is set to begin as American astronauts once again launch on an American rocket from American soil to the International Space Station as part of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program,” Danielle Sempsrott said on NASA’s blog.

She added: “As the final flight test for SpaceX, this mission will validate the company’s crew transportation system, including the launch pad, rocket, spacecraft and operational capabilities. This also will be the first time NASA astronauts will test the spacecraft systems in orbit.”

The last manned launch from the Kennedy Space Center was July 8, 2011: a mission to the ISS by the space shuttle Atlantis, the last of the space shuttles to be retired. The 12-day mission delivered spare parts to the space station to help keep it in orbit and marked NASA’s 135th shuttle mission over three decades.

The new mission marks the first time NASA will partner with a private company for a manned flight. Liftoff is scheduled for 4:32 p.m. EDT from Launch Pad 39A, with the crew capsule loaded onto SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket.

SpaceX first sent an unmanned flight to the ISS in March 2019, but the capsule used on that flight was destroyed in a ground-based accident a month later. The company holds a $2.6 billion contract with NASA for six operational flights, the first of which is to be scheduled once the Demo-2 flight is deemed a success. The crew for the operational mission has been announced as NASA astronauts Michael Hopkins, Victor Glover, Jr., Shannon Walker and Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Soichi Noguchi.

NASA also has a manned flight contract with Boeing worth $4.2 billion. Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner spacecraft, however, failed to reach the space station on a December flight because of a software glitch and it was unclear whether NASA would order a redesign.