Elon Musk has another reason to celebrate.
The billionaire’s SpaceX capture carrying four new astronauts arrived at the International Space Station and managed to successfully dock.
This marks a major step to bring home NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams. Both were stuck in space for more than nine months due to tech issues with the original spacecraft.
The SpaceX crew Dragon capsule docked on Sunday at 4:04 am, which is approximately 29 hours after it launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
The latest arrivals were welcomed by the station’s current seven-member crew including the likes of Wilmore and Williams. The spacecraft encountered several technical issues, including problems with the thrusters that are crucial for slowing the capsule upon re-entry and also any helium leaks in the propulsion system.
As a result, NASA determined that it was just too risky to bring back on the Starliner. Instead, NASA opted to have the return done through the SpaceX’s Crew Dragon. This meant it would need to wait for a scheduled rotation of the crew, extending the mission by a few months. Now, the astronauts are expected to return to earth by this week.