NASA's SpaceX Crew-13 launches as astronaut brings 100-year-old heirloom on trip
The crew launched to the International Space Station on Thursday morning.
When Canadian Space Agency astronaut Joshua Kutryk climbed aboard the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft atop the Falcon 9 rocket that is taking him and the other three members of NASA's SpaceX Crew-13 to the International Space Station on Thursday, he brought a more than 100-year-old pocket watch.
Kutryk, a fourth-generation Ukrainian Canadian, said he was bringing the timepiece because "I need a watch to tell time," but also because it's been a family heirloom since the first generation that reminds him of how far his family and the world have come.
"For me, it's really neat to look at that and reflect on just how much has changed in those 100 years, a little over 100 years," said Kutryk during a prelaunch news conference in August. "If that's how much change in the last hundred years, how much more could change if we do things right in the next hundred?"
Despite concerns about bad weather, the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft carrying Kutryk, NASA astronauts Jessica Watkins and Luke Delaney, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Sergey Teteryatnikov lifted off successfully at 11:10 a.m. ET, from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.
Just before liftoff, launch controllers thanked the crew for "their commitment to human spaceflight" and wished them "Godspeed." Watkins replied by thanking the NASA, SpaceX, CSA and Roscosmos teams, saying "It's an honor and privilege to represent all of you who have contributed to the success of this mission. With gratitude and grace, Crew-13 is ready to fly."
It will take 7 hours and 50 minutes for the crew to reach the ISS, with docking time scheduled for 7 p.m. ET. NASA and SpaceX said this will be the fastest trip to the ISS for an American spacecraft.
"The angle separation between space station and Dragon is very, very close, and that's just essentially orbital mechanics that got us in the right place," said Bill Gerstenmaier, vice president of Build and Flight Reliability at SpaceX, during a prelaunch news conference on Wednesday. "There was a recent orbit adjustment maneuver done by space station, and that kind of set things up, and we just kind of got lucky that they line up and work out extremely well."
Hatch opening will take place around 8:45 p.m. ET. After a brief handover period with Crew-12, that team, which has been on the station since February, will return to Earth as early as Monday, Oct. 5.
This is Watkins' second trip to space and Delaney, Kutryk and Teteryatnikov's first spaceflight. Crew-13 will spend about six months on the station. The mission is part of NASA's Commercial Crew Program.
"During the mission, the crew will help researchers treat heart disease and Parkinson's disease by studying human stem-cell-derived tissues that can help improve medicine, disease modeling, and pharmaceutical testing," said Dana Weigel, manager of NASA's Low Earth Orbit Program at the agency's Johnson Space Center in Houston, on NASA's website. "They also will explore crop production, which is important for longer-duration spaceflight missions, help us better understand blood flow abnormalities that we see in space, and test new diagnostic medical equipment for monitoring crew health."
"Once our Crew-13 arrives on board station, they'll quickly get acclimated and we'll conduct a relatively short handover with our Crew-12 preparing to return home early next week," said Lori Glaze, NASA's associate administrator for the Human Spaceflight Mission Directorate, during Wednesday's news conference.
The launch of the Crew-13 mission was delayed in August because of a mechanical issue involving an oxidizer leak in the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft's propulsion system, discovered during environmental checks. Gerstenmaier said SpaceX also troubleshot unexpected problems with the vehicle's GPS and a rocket engine motor microcontroller. But after a Launch Readiness Review on Wednesday afternoon, NASA and SpaceX declared they were "go for launch."
"The spaceflight gave us some surprises here," said Gerstenmaier. "But the absolute number one priority for us is to get the crew safely to orbit. We will continue to look at data. We will continue to review information. We'll look back through past records. We'll make sure everything is right, and when we're ready to go fly, we'll go fly."
While sometimes considered unlucky, the crew has embraced the number 13 mission designation. On their mission patch, which the crew designed, the team pays homage to Apollo 13. The Crew-13 patch features a golden dragon reminiscent of the three golden horses on the Apollo 13 patch.
November will mark the 26th year of continuous human presence aboard the space station. In that time, more than 280 astronauts from 26 countries and the station's five international partners have spent time on the ISS.
"The space station, as you know, is approaching 26 years of continuous operations, where research and technology demonstrations continue to benefit people here on Earth. They strengthen our U.S. leadership in space and ensure that we're ready for sustained human exploration beyond Earth's orbit," said Glaze.
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