A SpaceX Cargo Dragon spacecraft recently arrived at the International Space Station (ISS), and NASA astronaut Jonny Kim captured the crucial docking procedure on video.
Kim recorded the footage through the window of another SpaceX vehicle — a Crew Dragon that brought the Crew-11 astronauts with it in August.
The NASA astronaut used a Nikon Z9 camera with a 15mm lens, shooting at ISO 1000, f/1.8, 1/500s. Kim later put the images together to create the time-lapse sequence, which he posted on X on Monday.
M+139: Time lapse of SpaceX CRS-33 Dragon docking to the Node2 Forward Port last week, taken from the window of Crew-11’s Dragon. Nikon Z9 | 15mm | ISO 1000, f/1.8, 1/500s. pic.twitter.com/cfiMAmyeQ0
Presenting events at a faster speed than real time, Kim’s time lapse shows the Cargo Dragon edging toward the docking port. With the ISS orbiting Earth at about 17,500 mph (28,164 kph), the SpaceX spacecraft had to reach exactly the same speed for a perfect rendezvous some 250 miles above Earth.
The SpaceX CRS-33 Dragon docked at the space station’s Node 2 forward port a day after launching on aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral, Florida, on August 24.
Although the docking was performed autonomously, NASA astronauts aboard the ISS were on hand to monitor the Cargo Dragon’s arrival and to provide manual override if necessary.
Dockings at the space station usually run without a hitch, but there have been occasional difficulties. In 2019, for example, an uncrewed Russian Soyuz MS-14 spacecraft failed to dock automatically due to issues with its radar system. A few days later, a second attempt ended in success.
And more recently, in June 2024, Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft carrying two astronauts experienced multiple thruster failures during its approach to the ISS, causing an aborted docking attempt before successfully connecting a short while later.
As part of regular deliveries, SpaceX’s Cargo Dragon spacecraft brought with it 5,000 pounds of supplies, including food and research equipment.
The spacecraft will remain docked at the orbital outpost for about four months before returning home with science research and hardware.
After 13 suborbital test flights and more than $15 billion in development costs, SpaceX's Starship has finally reached orbit. The 407-foot megarocket, the most powerful ever built, lifted off from Starbase, Texas, on Monday and delivered its first real payload on it's 14th attempt. The celebration came with an asterisk, though, since SpaceX had to cut the planned 10-hour mission to roughly three hours.
https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/2104601695711904180
SpaceX is finally ready to give Starship its biggest test yet. The company says the massive rocket's 14th test flight is scheduled for September 22, when it will attempt to put the upper stage into Earth orbit for the first time. The launch is currently pending regulatory approval, with a 75-minute window opening at 7:15 a.m. CT.
Starship has 26 Starlink satellites to deliver
For decades, humanity has looked up at the Moon and wondered what it would be like to live on it. Think sprawling cities, factories, research centers, and permanent human settlements. Unfortunately, there is one fairly fundamental problem with that vision.
A new study published in Frontiers in Space Technologies argues that even the Moon's potentially enormous reserves of frozen water may be nowhere near enough to support city-sized populations sustainably. Researchers Martin Elvis and Jonathan McDowell estimate that the permanently shadowed regions near the lunar poles could contain roughly one billion tons of water. It sounds like an extraordinary amount until you put a million thirsty humans next to it.