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WATCH NOW: SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft Undocking from the Space Station - back to Earth @replay
The SpaceX cargo Dragon spacecraft carrying out the company’s 21st commercial resupply services (CRS-21) mission for NASA undocks from the International Space Station, heading for splashdown off the coast of Florida about 12 hours later. This upgraded Dragon transports significantly more science back to Earth than possible in previous Dragon capsules and is the first space station cargo capsule to splash down off the coast of Florida.
Launch window begins at 09:05am ET (02:05pm UTC)
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As the spacecraft returns to Earth, the experiments start to experience the effects of gravity again. Splashdown sets into motion rapid operations to return the samples and experiments back to researchers around the world. After a SpaceX boat scoops the capsule out of the water, a waiting team pulls time-critical science out of the spacecraft and loads it onto a waiting helicopter. The helicopter will deliver this science to shore a few hours after splashdown. Any remaining scientific cargo will come back either in a second helicopter load or stay aboard the boat and be removed at the port.
The helicopter will land the experiments at the Shuttle Landing Facility (SLF), previously used for space shuttle return activities. Then a team will move most of the cargo to the Kennedy Space Center Space Station Processing Facility (SSPF) by truck, where science teams will be waiting.
From the hub at Kennedy Space Center, the science samples and experiments will head around the globe to California, Texas, Massachusetts, Japan, and more locations. The large amount of science returning to Earth on this mission is possible thanks to upgrades to the SpaceX cargo Dragon spacecraft, which has double the powered locker capability of the company’s previous capsules. On return, it can support up to 12 powered lockers, enabling transport of more cold cargo and power for additional payloads.
Courtesy of NASA
www.nasa.gov
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