After five successful missions to the International Space Station, including four official resupply missions for NASA, SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft lifted off from Launch Complex 40 at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, for their fifth official Commercial Resupply (CRS) mission to the orbiting lab.
The launch was targeted for Saturday, January 10 at 4:47am EST. A live launch webcast began at approximately 4:30am EST. Dragon was scheduled to arrive at the station approximately two days after liftoff.
Dragon is expected to return to Earth four-and-a-half weeks after liftoff for a parachute-assisted splashdown off the coast of southern California. Dragon is the only operational spacecraft capable of returning a significant amount of supplies back to Earth, including experiments.
Filed Under: Aerospace + defense