On Tuesday, NASA and SpaceX officially signed the Human Rating Certification plan just ahead of the agency’s SpaceX Crew-1 mission, marking the first certified commercial spacecraft rated to board humans.
The Crew Dragon together with the Falcon 9 rocket is the first crew spacecraft to be NASA-certified for regular flight with humans aboard since NASA’s space shuttle almost four decades ago.
Jim Bridenstine, NASA administrator, said “I’m extremely proud to say we are returning regular human spaceflight launches to American soil on an American rocket and spacecraft.” Bridenstine continued, “This certification milestone is an incredible achievement from NASA and SpaceX that highlights the progress we can make working together with commercial industry.”
🎫 All aboard! It's time for another #LaunchAmerica mission.
Get your own virtual boarding pass for the NASA @SpaceX Crew-1 launch, taking flight on Nov. 14. Download, print, and share it with us and we might feature you on NASA TV: https://t.co/mNRSWWdZzP pic.twitter.com/XyYx6aeJbj
— NASA (@NASA) November 8, 2020
A number of pre-flight demos, ground tests, and other methods have been ongoing on a regular basis since 2018, all in preparation for Crew Dragon’s targeted launch on a Falcon 9, set to occur Saturday, November 14 at Kennedy Space Center.
This includes the rocket’s recent Crew Dragon Demo-2 launch in May, from which NASA astronauts safely splashed back down to Earth in August. This return signified a successful final air test before the official first launch, set for Saturday.
NASA’s SpaceX Crew-1 mission will fly astronauts Michael Hopkins, Victor Glover, Shannon Walker, and Soichi Noguchi to and from the International Space Station over the course of the next six months – an exciting first flight of many to come in preparations for future missions to the moon and Mars.
