scienceUpdated: Nov 16, 2020, 06:42 ISTNasa and SpaceX on Sunday launched four astronauts on a Tesla-manufactured Falcon 9 flight to send them to the International Space Station (ISS) marking the space administration’s first mission where it sent astronauts on a full-fledged mission aboard a privately owned spacecraft. The spacecraft will take Crew Dragon Resilience team consisting of astronauts Mike Hopkins, a US Air Force colonel , physicist Shannon Walker, Japanese astronaut Soichi Noguchi along with navy commander and rookie astronaut Victor Glover (who is the first Black astronaut to spend full six months aboard the space station) to the International Space Station via the Falcon9 spacecraft. Watch Falcon 9 launch Crew Dragon on its first operational mission to the @space_station with astronauts on board → https://t.co/bJFjLCzWdK https://t.co/Sx1UE8lgsD — SpaceX (@SpaceX) November 15, 2020The families of the astronauts present at Nasa’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida greeted the astronauts and waved them goodbye as they prepared for takeoff. SpaceX’s first regular space flight which is set to take off from Florida’s Kennedy Space Center is a reusable rocket named Falcon 9 developed and built by SpaceX. Nasa administrator Jim Bridenstine had told reporters that this mission means that there can now be operational flights to the International Space Station.

Source: Hindustan Times November 16, 2020 00:27 UTC