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Weather Remains Primary Concern for Crew-6 Return

NASA and SpaceX met Friday evening to continue close evaluations of weather conditions around Florida’s coastline as they consider the best options for Crew-6 to return to Earth. Teams are working toward an undocking opportunity of no earlier than 7:05 a.m. EDT on Sunday, Sept. 3, with the first potential splashdown opportunity no earlier than 12:07 a.m. on Monday, Sept. 4. Teams are proceeding to the next weather briefing scheduled for Saturday morning to continue assessing weather for the primary target. Additional undock and splashdown opportunities are available early next week if weather conditions continue to be unfavorable over the weekend.

The Dragon spacecraft, named Endeavour, remains healthy while currently docked to the International Space Station. Dragon has been cleared for departure and re-entry by the space station and Dragon mission management teams. Pre-departure checkouts of the spacecraft were conducted Friday with normal performance across all systems. Operations teams are not working any major issues and there are currently no constraints to flight.

For the current undocking opportunity, NASA TV coverage can be found of the agency’s television schedule.

Follow along for details about the crew’s return to Earth and NASA’s Commercial Crew Program on the Crew-6 blog, the space station blog, the commercial crew blog, @commercial_crew on X, and commercial crew on Facebook.

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Danielle Sempsrott

Science Ramps Up as Crew Departure Preps Continue

The Expedition 69 crew is expected to split up soon when four flight engineers return to Earth aboard the SpaceX Dragon Endeavour spacecraft. Meanwhile, all crew members on the International Space Station spent Friday keeping up their orbital research and maintenance tasks.

Unfavorable weather conditions off the coast of Florida have pushed back Saturday’s planned undocking and splashdown of four station crew members at least 24 hours. Mission managers from SpaceX and NASA are now targeting the undocking of Endeavour with four crewmates inside for no earlier than 7:05 a.m. EDT on Sunday.

Endeavour, commanded by Stephen Bowen and piloted by Woody Hoburg, both NASA astronauts, is targeted to splash down in the waters off Florida’s coast at 12:07 a.m. on Monday. Flanking the NASA duo during the 19-hour ride back to Earth will be UAE (United Arab Emirates) astronaut Sultan Alneyadi and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev. The quartet will be completing a six-month space research mission that began with a launch from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center on March 2.

New station flight engineers Jasmin Moghbeli of NASA, Andreas Mogensen of ESA (European Space Agency), Satoshi Furukawa of JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency), and Konstantin Borisov of Roscosmos have been familiarizing themselves with station systems all week. They are turning their attention now to full-time science, cargo, and health activities having been living on the space station since Aug. 27.

Moghbeli transferred research samples to science freezers that will be returned to Earth inside the Endeavour spacecraft with the departing crewmates. Mogensen set up a pair of Kubik research incubators that support studies of seeds, cells, and small mammals inside the Columbus laboratory module. Furukawa worked in the Kibo laboratory module removing a microbiology experiment from a research incubator that can generate artificial gravity. Finally, Borisov unpacked cargo from the Roscosmos Progress 85 cargo craft and tested ways future crews might pilot spacecraft and robots on planetary missions.

The space station’s other three crewmates are due to leave the orbital lab at the end of September completing just over one year orbiting Earth. In the meantime, the trio from NASA and Roscosmos has continued its research and lab upkeep tasks. Astronaut and Flight Engineer Frank Rubio configured and stowed emergency masks and had his eyes scanned by Mogensen using standard medical imaging hardware. Cosmonaut and Commander Sergey Prokopyev partnered with Borisov for the Progress 85 cargo unpacking duties. Flight Engineer Dmitri Petelin also participated in the futuristic piloting study, then inspected windows in the Zvezda service module, and inventoried cargo in the Poisk module.

Learn more about station activities by following the space station blog, @space_station and @ISS_Research on X, as well as the ISS Facebook and ISS Instagram accounts.

Get weekly video highlights at: https://roundupreads.jsc.nasa.gov/videoupdate/

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Mark Garcia

Weather Delays NASA’s SpaceX Crew-6 Undocking from Station on Saturday

NASA and SpaceX are standing down from the Saturday, Sept. 2, departure opportunities for the agency’s Crew-6 mission from the International Space Station due to unfavorable weather conditions near the splashdown sites off the coast of Florida. The next available undocking opportunity is no earlier than 7:05 a.m. EDT on Sunday, Sept. 3, with a splashdown no earlier than 12:07 a.m. on Monday, Sept. 4, pending weather evaluations.

Mission teams will meet Friday evening to determine the viability of the next Crew-6 undock target. The Dragon spacecraft, named Endeavour, remains healthy while currently docked to the space station as Crew-6 prepares for their return trip to Earth completing a nearly six-month science mission in orbit.

Crew-6’s Dragon undocking depends on a variety of factors, including spacecraft readiness, recovery team readiness, weather, sea states, and other factors.

NASA will provide more information about live coverage of the upcoming return activities for the Crew-6 mission with NASA astronauts Stephen Bowen and Woody Hoburg, as well as UAE (United Arab Emirates) astronaut Sultan Alneyadi, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev.

NASA TV coverage for the Sept. 3 undocking and Sept. 4 splashdown opportunity, if it is chosen, will be:

Sunday, Sept. 3 (All times eastern and subject to change depending on operations)

5 a.m. – Hatch closure coverage; ending shortly after hatch closure

6:45 a.m. – Coverage resumes for undocking, ending after Dragon departs Approach Ellipsoid

(Coverage shifts to Mission Audio commentary after approach ellipsoid exit)

7:05 a.m. – Undocking

11 p.m. – Coverage resumes for deorbit burn and splashdown

11:15 p.m. – Deorbit burn

Monday, Sept. 4

12:07 a.m. – Splashdown

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Danielle Sempsrott