NASAs SpaceX Crew-1 astronauts aboard theInternational Space Stationwill mark another first for commercial spaceflight Monday, April 5, when the four astronauts will relocate the Crew Dragon spacecraft to prepare for the arrival of new crew members in late April and the upcoming delivery of new solar arrays this summer.
Live coverage will begin at 6 a.m. EDT on NASA Television, theNASA app, and the agencyswebsite.
NASA astronautsMichael Hopkins,Victor Glover, andShannon Walker, along with Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) astronautSoichi Noguchi, will undock Crew Dragon Resilience from the forward port of the stations Harmony module at 6:29 a.m. and dock to the space-facing port at 7:15 a.m.
The relocation will free Harmonys forward port for the docking of Crew Dragon Endeavour, set to carry four crew members to the station on NASAs SpaceX Crew-2 mission. NASA astronautsShane KimbroughandMegan McArthur, JAXA astronautAkiHoshide,and ESA (European Space Agency) astronautThomasPesquet are scheduled to launch to the station Thursday, April 22, from Launch Complex 39A at NASAs Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
The Crew-1 astronauts will depart the station and return to Earth in late April or early May, leaving the space-facing port of Harmony vacant. A Dragon cargo spacecraft carrying several tons of supplies and the first set of new solar arrays for the space station is scheduled to launch this summer, and requires the space-facing port position to enable robotic extraction of the arrays from Dragons trunk using Canadarm2.
This will be the first port relocation of a Crew Dragon spacecraft. NASAs SpaceX Crew-1 mission lifted offNov. 15, 2020, and docked to the space station Nov. 16. The mission is the first of six certified crew missions NASA and SpaceX planned as a part of the agencys Commercial Crew Program.
