NASA gives approval to conduct the first unpiloted test flight of SpaceX capsule
Demonstration Mission-1 will launch from Cape Canaveral, Florida, on 2nd March
The American Space Agency and SpaceX have agreed to conduct the first uncrewed test flight of SpaceX's newly designed passenger capsule to the International Space Station (ISS), on the 2nd March.
NASA gave the final approval on Friday following a day of flight readiness review, which enabled the organisation to determine that the capsule was ready to travel to the ISS.
"Following a full day of briefings and discussion, NASA and SpaceX are proceeding with plans to conduct the first uncrewed test flight of the Crew Dragon on a mission to the International Space Station," NASA said in a statement.
NASA's approval clears a major hurdle from the way of billionaire Elon Musk's space firm in its quest to assist the Agency in launching an American astronaut into space from American soil. It would be the first time this has happened since 2011, when the US space shuttle programme abruptly came to an end.
Crew Dragon's first test flight will be launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida, on the 2nd March. The long-awaited flight is a significant milestone in NASA's $6.8 billion Commercial Crew Programme, which intends to end the Agency's sole dependency on Russia's Soyuz spacecraft to send American astronauts to the ISS.
It is an expensive arrangement for the USA, and has limited the types of space missions that NASA could run.
If all goes well with the test (Demonstration Mission-1, or DM-1), NASA and SpaceX plan to conduct the first piloted test flight of Dragon Capsule in July, which will take two astronauts to the ISS. The success of the mission would enable NASA to once again launch American astronauts into space using US-made vehicles, as the agency did prior to 2011.
During DM-1, the capsule will launch at 2:48AM ET on 2nd March. It will stay in orbit until Sunday morning before attempting to dock with the space station. The capsule will remain docked at the ISS for about the next week, before detaching itself on Friday morning to commence its return journey to Earth and splashing down in the Atlantic Ocean near Florida.
The mission is expected to provide vital data to NASA and SpaceX about how the capsule performs in space and whether it is ready to carry astronauts to the ISS in future.
"It's a test flight, but it's more than a test flight," Bill Gerstenmaier, director of human spaceflight operations at NASA Headquarters, said of the uncrewed test flight.
"I guarantee everything will not work exactly right, and that's cool. That's exactly what we want to do," he added
"This is an absolutely critical first step that we do as we move towards eventually returning crew launch capability back here to the US."