The NASA and SpaceX Crew-7 mission successfully took off early this Saturday from the Kennedy Space Center, in Cape Canaveral (Florida, USA), aboard the Endurance spacecraft and headed for the International Space Station (ISS). ), where the crew will conduct various experiments and take over from Crew-6. A few hours earlier, the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) published on social networks the first images that its Chandrayaan-3 lunar rover has sent from the surface of the Moon, at the south pole of the satellite. Both achievements have managed to rekindle interest in space exploration, which does not cease, and promises new discoveries that will expand human knowledge.
Liftoff of Crew-7 took place, as scheduled, at 3:27 local time today (7:27 GMT) from Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center.
After separation, the first stage of the Falcon 9 landed at Landing Zone 1 (LZ-1) at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, as seen in a live broadcast.
As detailed by NASA specialists, the docking of the Endurance spacecraft to the ISS and the departure of the astronauts will not take place until Sunday.
The Crew-7 mission, the seventh manned mission to the ISS by NASA and SpaceX, is led by astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli, selected by NASA in 2017, and Andreas Mogensen, from the European Space Agency (ESA).
In addition, astronauts Satoshi Furukawa, from the Japanese agency JAXA, and Konstantin Borisov, from the Russian Roscosmos, are traveling on the ship.
During their stay in the orbital laboratory, the crew will conduct science and technology demonstrations to prepare for human exploration beyond low-Earth orbit and benefit humanity on Earth, according to SpaceX on its website.
Crew-7 is developed within the framework of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program (CCP), through which the US agency commissions private aerospace firms such as SpaceX to transport crew and cargo to the ISS, in addition to other missions in low Earth orbit.
The return to Earth of the Crew-6 crew will take place about five days later, depending on weather conditions, so NASA cannot yet set an exact date.
Five days after Crew-7’s arrival, Crew-6 will undock, “enough time for a good handover between the two crews and for the Crew-7 guys to be ready to ‘rock’n’ ‘roll,'” Joel Montalbano, ISS program manager at NASA, said recently in a teleconference.
NASA Crew-6 will leave the ISS after completing a six-month stay and conducting important scientific research.
In a connection from the ISS last Tuesday, NASA astronauts Stephen Bowen and Woody Hoburg, United Arab Emirates astronaut Sultan Alneyadi and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev answered many of the questions posed by the crews in a relaxed and humorous way. journalists.
The three spacewalks carried out, the maintenance work on the space station, the scientific investigations and the visit to the ISS by the private Axiom mission last May were some of the highlights of the Crew-6 mission, they said. .
The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) published this Friday the first images of the development of its Chandrayaan-3 space mission on the surface of the Moon, including the first steps of its explorer after the successful landing on the south pole of the satellite. .
The Indian space agency shared on the social network X, formerly Twitter, two photographs of the place on which Chandrayaan-3 landed last Wednesday, and which were taken by the orbiter that India sent to the Moon on its last mission to the satellite. .
“I spy on you,” ISRO wrote in a message to accompany images posted on the mission’s X account, showing the cratered lunar surface, including the Chandrayaan-3 lander.
The agency also released a short video of the first moments of its rover “Pragyaan” on the Moon, showing the six-wheeler descending down a small ramp protruding from the “Vikram” lander, to begin its tour of the moon. moon surface.
So far, the rover has traveled “a distance of about eight meters,” ISRO reported in a subsequent publication, where it reported that the rover’s payloads, as well as those of the lander and orbiter, are working properly.
The rover, about 23 kilograms, is a six-wheeled robot that will collect information and images of the lunar soil that it will send back to Earth. It will also help the Indian space agency to study the composition of the lunar surface using X-rays and lasers.
In turn, the lander has four scientific instruments or payloads, which will analyze the seismic activity of the Moon, study the heat flux and density of the plasma near the surface, and will allow a more precise measurement of the distance between the Earth and its satellite.
Both elements will send data to ISRO scientists for 14 Earth days, equivalent to one lunar day, as they both rely on sunlight to function.
To do this they will rely on the orbiter that Chandrayaan-3’s predecessor mission left running in 2019 around the Moon, the only surviving component from that mission after the lander crashed into the lunar surface during descent.
Four years later, the historic moon landing of its successor made India the fourth nation to land on the moon, along with the US, Russia and China, and the first to land on its south pole.
