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Get Ready for a Halloween Treat, Four Astronauts Will Ride a SpaceX Crew Dragon to the ISS

This weekend, we're in for a Halloween launch! As part of NASA's Commercial Crew Program, NASA and SpaceX are now carrying the last preparations to fly astronauts to the ISS. SpaceX Crew-3 will be the third crew rotation mission, and it will send four astronauts to the orbiting laboratory for a six-month stay.
SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket with Crew Dragon vertical on Launch Complex 39A 7 photos
Photo: SpaceX via Twitter
Falcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon vertical on Launch Complex 39AFalcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon vertical on Launch Complex 39AFalcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon vertical on Launch Complex 39AFalcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon vertical on Launch Complex 39ACrew-3 astronauts test out their flight hardwareCrew-3 astronauts test out their flight hardware
NASA astronauts Raja Chari, Tom Marshburn, Kayla Barron, and ESA astronaut Matthias Maurer will board a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule in the early hours of Sunday, October 31st.

The spacecraft, named Endurance by the crew, will take off atop a Falcon 9 rocket into space at 2:21 a.m. EDT. Astronauts are expected to dock with the orbiting lab 22 hours later from launch.

Building upon knowledge gathered from previous flights, SpaceX made several enhancements to the Crew Dragon system for Crew-3. The spacecraft now has new software that provides more reliability and improved computer performance during re-entry. It also helps the spacecraft's docking procedures and mechanisms to mitigate hardware interference on the space station, and it features more cleaning techniques to reduce foreign object debris.

Once the Crew Dragon Endurance docks with the ISS, the astronauts will be welcomed by the Expedition 66 crew, including the Crew-2 astronauts still aboard who flew to the station back in April. After a brief handover period, Crew-2 astronauts will return to Earth in early November.

The new team will spend six months on the ISS, where they will conduct scientific research in areas such as materials science, health technologies, and plant science.

Currently, the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, with the Crew Dragon spacecraft atop, is waiting on the launch pad at Kennedy Space Center in Florida in preparation for NASA's SpaceX Crew-3 launch. The rocket arrived at the launch site on October 26th, and it is now ready to take off with the crew on Halloween.
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About the author: Florina Spînu
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Florina taught herself how to drive in a Daewoo Tico (a rebadged Suzuki Alto kei car) but her first "real car" was a VW Golf. When she’s not writing about cars, drones or aircraft, Florina likes to read anything related to space exploration and take pictures in the middle of nature.
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