The mission will launch from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station aboard SpaceX’s Dragon capsule. NASA and SpaceX are targeting a launch at 11:10 a.m. and the Space Force said weather conditions are about 55% favorable.
Central Florida Residents may hear sonic booms about eight minutes after launch as SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket’s booster returns to Earth.
Serving as pilot for the mission is NASA astronaut Luke Delaney, who is from DeBary and attended Deltona High School in Volusia County. He said launching near his hometown is special for him.
“It might just be the weather, but I think it actually is just because coming here to Kennedy, coming back to Florida, is definitely near and dear to my heart,” Delaney said. “I did grow up pretty close to here. I got to watch space shuttle launches, and now I'm going to get to see it from a little bit different perspective I think in the coming days.”
Students at his former high school are expected to watch the launch. The school has declared Thursday "Luke Delaney Day" and will host a watch party for students and if the weather conditions are favorable, students will step outside to see the rocket head towards the space station.
Delaney is one of two NASA astronauts on the mission alongside Jessica Watkins. He’s joined by Canadian astronaut Joshua Kutryk, and Russian cosmonaut Sergey Teteryatnikov.
For Delaney, it’s his first mission to space, and he’s excited to help in studies of how space impacts the human body for future exploration missions.
“It definitely puts things in perspective for me when I think about all the human and physiological aspects,” he said. “Everybody's different. Everybody's bodies (are) different. We're still trying to characterize a lot of things, but yeah, it impresses upon me really heavily in terms of what we're doing on station and just how meaningful it is for what we're going to do beyond low Earth orbit.”
It will take about eight hours for the spacecraft to catch up to the Space Station and dock.
Crew-13 will be SpaceX’s 14th flight with NASA astronauts, and the 13th crew rotation with SpaceX’s human space transportation system.
