Last night, SpaceX made history as it launched four astronauts on a ~27 hour voyage to the International Space Station (ISS) aboard the Crew Dragon Resilience spacecraft. During the Crew-1 mission NASA Astronauts Michael Hopkins, Shannon Walker, Victor Glover, and JAXA astronaut Soichi Noguchi, launched atop a Falcon 9 rocket from Launch Complex 39A at Florida's Kennedy Space Center. The agency is sharing Live footage of the ongoing Crew-1 mission, video below. When the spacecraft reached orbit on Sunday, the astronauts entered microgravity and viewers noticed a fifth crew member --Baby Yoda hitched a ride aboard SpaceX's Crew Dragon spacecraft!
The Force is with SpaceX Crew-1.
Baby Yoda is a beloved character from Disney's Star Wars series "The Mandalorian." The cute creature loves to play with spacecraft switches -- good thing Crew Dragon features touchscreen displays.
The Crew-1 astronauts selected a Baby Yoda plush toy to be their 'zero-gravity indicator' for the mission. It is a tradition in spaceflight to take a small object that indicates when the astronauts reached space microgravity environment. Taking a cute toy also serves to get children excited about space exploration. Baby Yoda can be seen floating inside Dragon while the astronauts are strapped to their seats on their way to the orbiting laboratory.
ISS Status: They are currently hiding all the eggs. pic.twitter.com/9XT820T71v
— Chris B - NSF (@NASASpaceflight) November 16, 2020
Crew-1 is expected to arrive to the space station tonight at around 11:00 p.m. Eastern time. Crew Dragon features the capability to dock autonomously to the ISS Harmony module. NASA Television is providing ongoing live coverage throughout the mission. The astronauts will dock, open the spacecraft's hatch to get inside the space station. The agency will host a Welcome ceremony on Tuesday. You can watch it Live in the video below.
NASA BROADCAST SCHEDULE
Nov. 16, Monday [All times in Eastern Time.]
Ongoing - Continuous coverage of the flight of NASA's SpaceX Crew-1 Mission on the “Resilience” Crew Dragon to the International Space Station (Mike Hopkins, Victor Glover, Shannon Walker, Soichi Noguchi) – Kennedy Space Center/ Hawthorne, Calif./Johnson Space Center
11:00 p.m. EST - Docking of the SpaceX “Resilience” Crew Dragon and the Crew-1 Crew to the International Space Station - Hawthorne, Calif./Johnson Space Center
Nov. 17, Tuesday
1:40 a.m. - Welcoming Ceremony for the SpaceX “Resilience” Crew Dragon Crew-1 Crew at the International Space Station (Mike Hopkins, Victor Glover, Shannon Walker, Soichi Noguchi) - Hawthorne, Calif./Johnson Space Center
2 a.m. (approximately) - SpaceX Crew-1 Mission post-docking news conference with senior NASA and JAXA officials (All Channels)
Nov. 18, Wednesday
8:30 a.m. – Coverage of the ISS Expedition 64 Russian Spacewalk #47 (Sergey Ryzhikov, Sergey Kud-Sverchkov; spacewalk scheduled to begin at 9:30 a.m. EST and will last around six hours) – Johnson Space Center
Nov. 19, Thursday
9:55 a.m. - ISS Expedition 64 Crew News Conference (Kate Rubins, Mike Hopkins, Victor Glover, Shannon Walker, Soichi Noguchi)
About the Author
Evelyn Arevalo
Evelyn J. Arevalo joined Tesmanian in 2019 to cover news as a Space Journalist and SpaceX Starbase Texas Correspondent. Evelyn is specialized in rocketry and space exploration. The main topics she covers are SpaceX and NASA.
