SpaceX's Crew Dragon spacecraft docks with the International Space Station
SpaceX's Crew Dragon spacecraft docks with the International Space Station
5:41

SpaceX's Crew Dragon spacecraft docks with the International Space Station

Science
You are looking at a live view of the Dragon spacecraft as it approaches the International Space Station for a planned docking in just under two and a half hours from now. Now that light you can see on your screen is indeed the Dragon-2 spacecraft from a view on the International Space Station. Space Station. This is Mission Control, Houston. You are getting a live view of the Dragon Spacecraft, now just about 3,000 meters away from the International Space Station. At this time the International Space Station about to enter into an orbital night time 266 statute miles above the Earth just south of Australia. Again about to enter an orbital night time, you'll see the views get a little bit darker. All right, and so this is our first view from the camera on dragon. So this is a forward view, right on the end of the nose, or right where the nose cone used to be No longer covering it but right by the docking port for the Dragon spacecraft. So, that's actually a view back at the International Space Station. But right here you can see the overlay that the crew would be seeing if they were inside Dragon right now. There is a little green dot in the very center, that's currently tracking the docking port, and if Dragon tilts away from it should stay tracked. But right now, since we're getting this in the ground this would normally be overlaid over the centerline camera. Right now, we're getting this feed from a different camera. It' a little bit off center. So it's not going to be exactly on all of the time. But it will simulate what a Dragon astronaut would be seeing if they were in the commander's seat on those touch screen displays. On the screen you can see the Draco thrusters. Firing of that dragon right now it's a little bright the contrast is a little off but you can see the- every time one of those Draco thrusters fires, I can see it's exhaust gas is speeding away from the dragon. It's a great view right there. It's great to get some views from the station side of Dragon. Yeah And hopefully once it gets in close, we'll get some views from those cameras right on the end of the docking adaptor. But it's always cool to see the thrusters fire in space, too look at them go. From under that, Dragon is a totally autonomous vehicle, it's station keeping, it's holding its position all by itself right now, those are all the Dragon flight computers making minute adjustments whenever it feels the need to. To stay pointed and in the right position, you can start to see the space stationing great detail here. Again, this is from a view of the foreign media cam at the top of the dragon two module. Just to reiterate, this camera is not directly on the center line of the docking axis. This is a fantastic view of Dragon in the sunlight from the International Space Station. So, normally when we're getting views from the Dragon for this webcast, you're gonna be seeing a camera that's not quite on the center one so it's a little bit off and it may not look like we're heading directly towards the docking adapter but if we're lucky enough we might get some views from the centerline camera in the very center hatch from the Space Station and you can see us kinda heading right in. But right now. This is an unbelievable view from the Space Station. You can see Dragon2 in full light with its nose cone open, its soft capture ring deployed. You can actually start to see those three petals that I was talking about earlier on that ring 120 degrees apart. That ring is extended above the hatch by six hexapod arms that are all attached to Dragon by springs. So that will be the first part of dragon and then they contact with the ISS. When it does those springs will compress and absorb and dampen any of the relative velocity differences between the space station and dragon. So the light you are seeing is both light from the international space station pointed at dragon and then the docking light Which is the bright spot in the center of Dragon's Hatch you can see right now. [BLANK_AUDIO] On the right-hand side, you can start to see the mechanisms of the SpaceX docking system aboard the Dragon. Out of very first part of dragon that will make contact with the ISS these that soft capture thing, you could see it's extended forward from the hatch of the dragon right now. As soon as those petals make contact, latching pulse will engage and whole the petals against the opposite of the IDA. And contact pins will depress and we should hear a call out for soft capture achieved. [BLANK_AUDIO] [INAUDIBLE] Copy. All right so we're at that crew hands off point that means we're about two meters away, crew no longer sending commands, the dragon doing everything on its own [BLANK_AUDIO] Self-capture confirmed. [APPLAUSE] [NOISE] You can hear the cheers [INAUDIBLE] California, we have confirmation of a soft capture of the dragon [INAUDIBLE] space station. You could see on your view, the dragon's still moving around a little bit. That's the soft capture ring is attached to the dragon by way of six arms that are all attached to springs. That help dampen the motion, or the difference in the relative velocities between the dragon and the space station. [APPLAUSE] [NOISE] And you're probably hearing- And Houston and one, we can confirm hard capture is complete. [APPLAUSE] Hard capture complete.

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