What You Need to Know about NASA’s SpaceX Crew-9 Mission | Space

NASA astronaut Nick Hague and Roscosmos cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov are preparing to launch on the agency’s SpaceX Crew-9 mission to the International Space Station.

The flight is the ninth crew rotation mission with SpaceX to the station under NASA’s Commercial Crew Program. The duo will lift off aboard the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft, which previously flew NASA’s SpaceX Crew-4, Axiom Mission 2 and Axiom Mission 3, from Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.

Once aboard the space station, Hague and Gorbunov will become members of the Expedition 72 crew and perform research, technology demonstrations, and maintenance activities. The pair will join NASA astronauts Don Petitt, Butch Wilmore, Suni Williams, as well as Roscosmos cosmonauts Alexey Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner.

Wilmore and Williams, who launched aboard the Starliner spacecraft in June, will fly home with Hague and Gorbunov in February 2025.

Launch preparations are underway, and teams are working to integrate the spacecraft and the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, including checkouts of a second flight rocket booster  for the mission. The integrated spacecraft and rocket will then be rolled to the pad and raised to the vertical position for a dry dress rehearsal with the crew and an integrated static fire test prior to launch.

Nick Hague will serve as crew commander for Crew-9, making this…