WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - The SpaceX Dragon spacecraft, carrying four-member crew as part of the fourth private astronaut mission to the International Space Station, has docked to the space-facing port of the space station's Harmony module at 6:31 a.m. ET on Thursday.
Four-member crew, led by veteran former NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson, flew to the orbiting laboratory on a new SpaceX Dragon spacecraft after the company's Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 2:31 a.m. ET on Wednesday.
Peggy Whitson, who is the director of human spaceflight at Axiom Space, is the commander of the commercial mission, while Indian astronaut Shubhanshu Shukla is serving as pilot. The two mission specialists are European Space Agency project astronaut Slawosz Uznanski-Wisniewski of Poland and Tibor Kapu of Hungary.
Expedition 73 crew members, who are already stationed at the orbiting laboratory, welcomed the Axiom Mission 4 astronauts to the space station.
At 8:14 a.m. ET, the hatch opened between the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft and the Space Station, NASA said in a press release.
The astronauts are scheduled to conduct microgravity research, educational outreach, and commercial activities for about two weeks, before returning to Earth and splashdown off the coast of California.
NASA+ live streamed the Axiom-4 mission docking with the orbiting laboratory and its four-member crew crossing over to the ISS.
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