Elon Musk SpaceX rocket launches to take astronauts from US, Japan, Russia and Denmark to International Space Station

• The astronauts should reach the orbiting lab in their SpaceX capsule Sunday

NASA and Elon Musk’s SpaceX rocket has blasted off to the International Space Station, taking astronauts each from the United States, Japan, Russia, and Denmark.

The Dragon spacecraft carried by a Falcon 9 rocket lifted off at 3.27am (07.27 GMT) from Launch Complex 39A before dawn on Saturday at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Around 10,000 people had gathered to watch the launch. 

They should reach the International Space Station in their SpaceX capsule Sunday, replacing four astronauts living up there since March.

It was the first U.S. launch where every spacecraft seat was occupied by a different country – until now, NASA had always included two or three of its own on its SpaceX taxi flights. A fluke in timing led to the assignments, officials said.

Cheers could be heard in the mission control room soon after the Dragon craft separated from the Falcon 9 rocket with the crew in orbit. 

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket with the Crew Dragon spacecraft with astronauts on a mission to the International Space Station lifts off from pad 39A at Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., Saturday

Crew-7 members (from left to right) Roscosmos cosmonaut Konstantin Borisov, European Space Agency astronaut Andreas Mogensen, NASA astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli, and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Satoshi Furukawa are pictured

People watch as the Crew-7 on the SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft takes off for the International Space Station at at Cape Canaveral, Florida, before dawn Saturday

‘We may have four crew members on board from four different nations… but we’re a united team with a common mission,’ Moghbeli said after the separation.

The launch was pushed back to Saturday to give engineers an extra day to review a component of the Crew Dragon capsule’s environmental control and life support system, NASA said in a blog post.

It is the first space mission for both Moghbeli and Borisov.

‘This is something I’ve wanted to do for as long as I can remember,’ said Moghbeli, a Naval test pilot, during a media call last month.

‘One of the things I’m most excited about is looking back at our beautiful planet,’ added the 40-year-old American.

‘Everyone who I’ve talked to who has flown already has said that was a life-changing perspective – and also floating around in space, it seems really fun.’

Crew-7 is set to be the seventh routine mission to the orbital platform for Elon Musk’s SpaceX, with the first coming in 2020.

NASA pays SpaceX for the taxi service as part of a commercial crew program that it put in place to reduce dependency on Russian rockets for astronaut transport after the space shuttle program ended in 2011.

Mission commander NASA astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli, one of the members of the NASA’s Crew-7, says goodbye to her family as they drive towards the shuttle in a Tesla

Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Satoshi Furukawa greets family members before riding to pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center

SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket with the Crew Dragon spacecraft carrying NASA’s SpaceX Crew-7 mission vents during fueling shortly before lifting off from Launch Complex 39A

Crew-7 on the SpaceX Crew Dragon rocket up into space from Cape Canaveral, Florida

Boeing is the other contracted private partner, but its program remains mired in delays and technical difficulties. It has not yet flown any crew.

Borisov will be the third Russian to fly on a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule, fixed atop a Falcon 9 rocket.

Space remains a rare area of cooperation between the United States and Russia despite Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, with Americans also continuing to fly aboard Russian Soyuz rockets that launch from Kazakhstan.

The crew will spend six months aboard the ISS, where they will carry out science experiments including collecting samples during a spacewalk to determine whether the station releases microorganisms through its life-support system vents.

The goal is to understand if microorganisms can survive and reproduce in space.

Another experiment will aim to assess the physiological differences between sleep on Earth and in space.

‘I’m looking forward to coping with all the tasks. This is a very interesting profession: you are preparing for something that you haven’t tried yet, and you really want to do it well,’ said Borisov.

Crew-7 will join the seven people already aboard the ISS, before members of Crew-6 leave for Earth a few days later.

European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Andreas Mogensen gestures as he prepares to depart the Neil A. Armstrong Operations and Checkout Building

Crew-7 astronauts depart their crew quarters for the launch pad before their mission to the International Space Station

Mission commander NASA astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli waves as she says goodbye to her family for six months as she heads to the International Space Station

The astronauts stand wearing SpaceX spacesuits, preparing to depart the Neil A. Armstrong Operations and Checkout Building for Launch Complex 39A to board the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft

NASA’s Moghbeli, a Marine pilot serving as commander, said her crew’s international makeup demonstrates ‘what we can do when we work together in harmony.’

With her on the six-month mission are the European Space Agency’s Andreas Mogensen, Japan’s Satoshi Furukawa and Russia’s Konstantin Borisov.

‘To explore space, we need to do it together,’ the European Space Agency’s director general, Josef Aschbacher, said minutes before liftoff. ‘Space is really global, and international cooperation is key.’

The astronauts’ paths to space couldn’t be more different.

Moghbeli’s parents fled Iran during the 1979 revolution. Born in Germany and raised on New York’s Long Island, she joined the Marines and flew attack helicopters in Afghanistan.

A first-time space traveler, Moghbeli hopes to show Iranian girls that they, too, can aim high. ‘Belief in yourself is something really powerful,’ she said before the flight.

Mogensen worked on oil rigs off the West African coast after getting an engineering degree. He told people puzzled by his job choice that ‘in the future we would need drillers in space’ like Bruce Willis’ character in the killer asteroid film ‘Armageddon.’ He’s convinced the rig experience led to his selection as Denmark’s first astronaut.

Furukawa spent a decade as a surgeon before making Japan’s astronaut cut. Like Mogensen, he’s visited the station before.

Crew-7 member NASA astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli waves to family members before riding to pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center

Borisov, a space rookie, turned to engineering after studying business. He runs a freediving school in Moscow and judges the sport, in which divers shun oxygen tanks and hold their breath underwater.

One of the perks of an international crew, they noted, is the food. Among the delicacies soaring: Persian herbed stew, Danish chocolate and Japanese mackerel.

Another NASA astronaut will launch to the station from Kazakhstan in mid-September under a barter agreement, along with two Russians.

SpaceX has now launched eight crews for NASA. Boeing was hired at the same time nearly a decade ago, but has yet to fly astronauts. Its crew capsule is grounded until 2024 by parachute and other issues.

The first segment of the ISS was launched in 1998, and it has been continuously inhabited by an international crew since 2001.

Its operations are set to continue until at least 2030, after which it will be decommissioned and crash into the ocean. Several private companies are working on commercial space stations to replace it.

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