On 22nd of May at 3:44 AM the first spacecraft owned and operated by a private company was launched from Cape Canaveral heading to International Space Station.
This mission considered to be a first test of unnamed capsule which is carried by Falcon 9 rocket. NASA wants to outsource operations of usual flights to ISS to a private company and focus on deep space missions such as landing on asteroids as well as planet Mars.
Credits: SpaceX
The Dragon capsule from SpaceX will meet Space Station at about 1700 miles per hour. Before connecting to ISS capsule will perform many tests to make sure it is ready for docking. As soon as that is done astronauts will use robotic arm to lead the capsule.
The Dragon is designed to carry up to seven astronauts and do it on a lower cost comparing to Shuttle program which was closed not so long ago. Before that is done NASA still has to pay $63 million dollars to Russia to get their astronauts to the station.
If the current mission for testing rocket and capsule will become a success SpaceX will start fulfilling their contract to deliver 12 cargos to Space station already this year.
