Connect with us

News

A 2021 SpaceX Odyssey: Dragon aces third astronaut launch, docks with space station

From one Crew Dragon to another: NASA astronaut Mike Hopkins watched Crew-2 Dragon C206's second ISS docking through Crew-1 Dragon C207's window. (NASA)

Published

5 years ago

on

Early on Saturday morning, SpaceX Crew Dragon ‘Endeavour’ (capsule C206) – carrying four international astronauts – flawlessly docked with the International Space Station (ISS) for the second time in less than a year.

Capping off a smooth 24 hours of free-flight following an equally successful Falcon 9 launch on Friday, April 23rd, Dragon’s third crewed space station arrival was captured in spectacular fashion – thanks in part to the presence of a separate Crew Dragon vehicle already docked to the orbiting outpost. Recently swapped between the two ISS docking ports capable of supporting Dragons, Crew-1 NASA astronaut Mike Hopkins had – by far – the best view in the house of Crew-2’s space station rendezvous while looking out the window of the other Crew Dragon on orbit.

Former NASA flight director and Space Shuttle program manager Wayne Hale put it best, stating that SpaceX “[made] it look easy” with a “perfectly successful [Crew-2] launch and docking” – the company’s third astronaut launch and space station rendezvous since May 2020.

Falcon 9 and Crew Dragon launch towards the ISS for the fourth time. (Richard Angle)
Crew Dragon C206 approaches the ISS for the second time in 11 months. (NASA)

After a mere three days of delays – one for weather – from an April 20th (4/20) target set almost three months earlier, Crew Dragon lifted off on SpaceX and NASA’s Crew-2 mission shortly before dawn on April 23rd. As the rocket rapidly carried Dragon and its passengers from sea level to dozens of kilometers above the Earth’s surface, it sailed into sunlight, producing a spectacle that stretched across a vast swath of the pre-dawn sky as the sun lit up Falcon 9’s second stage exhaust plume.

(Richard Angle)

The four astronauts aboard the flight-proven Dragon were equally amazed as the inky black vacuum outside their spacecraft’s windows turned to blinding, unfiltered sunlight. One spectacle and a flawless trip into orbit on Falcon 9 behind them, French European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Thomas Pesquet caught a glimpse of the rocket’s expended second stage effectively flying in formation a few miles below Crew Dragon.

Crew-2’s Falcon 9 second stage (S2) and Merlin Vacuum engine were easily visible from the free-flying capsule – likely not long after the rocket completed a successful deorbit burn. (Thomas Pesquet – ESA)

After almost exactly 24 hours on its own and five major Draco thruster orbit-raising and trajectory-matching burns, as well as an unwelcome collision avoidance warning that ultimately turned out to be a false alarm, Crew Dragon capsule C206 completed its second space station docking without delay around 5am on April 24th. Pesquet has published several dozen excellent photos of the flight and docking, offering the best look yet at what life aboard a free-flying Dragon is really like for the four astronauts packed into a volume – as he himself notes – roughly equivalent to a large car’s cabin.

Japanese (JAXA) astronaut Akihiko “Aki” Hoshide takes a nap beside one of Dragon’s two windows. (Thomas Pesquet)
Several dozen miles out, Crew-2 spotted the football-field-sized ISS as a tiny speck floating in space. (Thomas Pesquet)

With its successful arrival, SpaceX – for the first time ever – had two separate Crew Dragon spacecraft docked to ISS simultaneously, marking the first of at least two more Dragon ‘hand-off’ milestones to come. Though NASA nominally planned to have Commercial Crew providers SpaceX and Boeing essentially take turns on operational astronaut ferry missions, the latter company’s Starliner spacecraft is more than a year and a half behind schedule and is unlikely to perform its first crewed demonstration flight before Q1 2022.

In other words, SpaceX has been forced to mature its Crew Dragon program much faster than expected to complete at least four back-to-back astronaut launches in ~17 months, while NASA is effectively dependent on the company to ensure the ISS remains fully crewed from May 2020 to sometime in 2022.

(NASA)
A spectacular front-seat view of Crew-2’s ISS arrival through the window of a different Dragon. (Mike Hopkins – NASA)

Following Crew-2’s smooth arrival, Crew-1’s Crew Dragon and its four-astronaut crew will return to Earth as early as April 28th. Sometime in October or November 2021, SpaceX will repeat that hand-off process once again when it launches Crew-3 and recovers Crew-2. There is a distant chance Boeing will have completed two successful test flights and be ready for Starliner’s operational astronaut launch debut in early 2022, but it’s arguably much more likely that SpaceX will also perform a third hand-off between Crew-3 and Crew-4 sometime in Q2 2022 before finally handing over the reins to Starliner.

Advertisement
Related Topics:

Eric Ralph is Teslarati's senior spaceflight reporter and has been covering the industry in some capacity for almost half a decade, largely spurred in 2016 by a trip to Mexico to watch Elon Musk reveal SpaceX's plans for Mars in person. Aside from spreading interest and excitement about spaceflight far and wide, his primary goal is to cover humanity's ongoing efforts to expand beyond Earth to the Moon, Mars, and elsewhere.

Advertisement
Comments

Cybertruck

Tesla begins wide rollout of Full Self-Driving v14 to Cybertruck

Published

9 hours ago

on

November 3, 2025

By

Credit: Weibo (via YYDS on X)

Tesla has officially begun the wide rollout of Full Self-Driving (Supervised) v14 to the Cybertruck about a month after the company started rolling it out to other vehicles in the fleet.

On Monday, Tesla officially started rolling out v14.1.5 to Cybertruck owners, the first FSD v14 rollout for owners of the all-electric pickup.

Owners have been anxiously waiting for Tesla to begin the wide release of v14 to Cybertruck, as the company said it would refine the suite for the vehicle.

Tesla has finally started rolling out to many owners, who are reporting that their Cybertrucks are downloading Software Update 2025.38.8.5, which contains FSD v14.1.5:

Tesla has to be more cautious with rolling out FSD on the Cybertruck than on other vehicles for a few reasons. Initially, the Cybertruck utilizes an all-wheel steering system that turns differently than the S3XY lineup. This creates a challenge for the Tesla AI team as they have to cater to this specific maneuvering change.

Additionally, the Cybertruck is much larger, and the exterior cameras responsible for seeing the vehicle’s surroundings are placed differently than those of the other vehicles.

This requires additional calibration to ensure safety.

The full release notes for Full Self-Driving v14.1.5 are as follows:

  • Added Arrival Options for you to select where FSD should park: in a Parking Lot, on the Street, in a Driveway, in a Parking Garage, or at the Curbside.
  • Added handling to pull over or yield for emergency vehicles (e.g. police cars, fire trucks, ambulances).
  • Added navigation and routing into the vision-based neural network for real-time handling of blocked roads and detours.
  • Added additional Speed Profile to further customize driving style preference.
  • Improved handling for static and dynamic gates.
  • Improved offsetting for road debris (e.g. tires, tree branches, boxes).
  • Improve handling of several scenarios including: unprotected turns, lane changes, vehicle cut-ins, and school buses.
  • Improved FSD’s ability to manage system faults and recover smoothly from degraded operation for enhanced reliability.
  • Added alerting for residue build-up on interior windshield that may impact front camera visibility. If affected, visit Service for cleaning!

Continue Reading

News

Elon Musk shuts down Tesla ‘AMG’ division speculation: ‘Focus is autonomy’

“I think it’s best to leave that to the custom shops. Tesla’s focus is autonomous cars, building futuristic autonomous cars. We want the future to look like the future.”

Published

11 hours ago

on

November 3, 2025

By

Credit: Unplugged Performance

Tesla CEO Elon Musk was asked by Joe Rogan late last week whether the company would ever consider establishing an “AMG division” like Mercedes-Benz has established for powerful, race-inspired vehicles.

However, Musk turned down any talk of that, highlighting that the company is laser-focused on autonomous vehicles, seemingly hinting that any distraction from autonomy would be a detriment to the future.

Rogan drives a Tesla Model S himself, but it is not your run-of-the-mill all-electric sedan. Already outfitted with the Plaid powertrain that Tesla developed, Rogan took his vehicle to Unplugged Performance for a true performance outfitting.

The vehicle is completely overhauled with performance parts and seats. Known as the Model S-APEX, Rogan took delivery of it from Unplugged in January.

Rogan asked Musk on Friday during his most recent appearance on the Joe Rogan Experience podcast whether Tesla would ever establish an “AMG division” that would focus on catering Teslas to performance-based standards.

Musk said:

“I think it’s best to leave that to the custom shops. Tesla’s focus is autonomous cars, building futuristic autonomous cars. We want the future to look like the future.”

Tesla fans have said for years that the company should consider acquiring Unplugged Performance and its Upfit Tesla division, which recently outfitted the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department’s fleet of Cybertruck cruisers.

However, it seems Tesla will keep things separate. Musk is primarily focused on autonomy, which will drive the technology forward and drive shareholder growth. Something like an outfitter for performance would be a cool thing for the owners who have the interest and the money.

It’s not a tremendous revenue driver or anything that would contribute to the financial state of the company. Mercedes-Benz, for example, is more accessible for consumers as it sold over 140,000 units from its AMG brand in 2024.

Tesla Model Y driver starts race in reverse, still wins against AMG SUV

It helps with driving revenue higher by as much as 15 percent compared to similar models that are not AMGs. However, would Tesla see this much of a benefit? Likely not, because the Performance trim already caters to many owners.

Continue Reading

Cybertruck

Tesla Cybertruck fleet takes over at SpaceX’s Starbase

Interestingly, the Cybertruck uses the same exterior, a stainless steel alloy, as SpaceX rockets. This synergy between the two companies and their very different products shows a very unified mentality between Musk companies.

Published

13 hours ago

on

November 3, 2025

By

Credit: @derek1ee | X

Tesla Cybertrucks have taken over at SpaceX’s Starbase facility in Texas, as hundreds of the all-electric pickup trucks were spotted late last week rounding out a massive fleet of vehicles.

The Cybertruck fleet is geared toward replacing gas vehicles that are used at Starbase for everyday operations. The only surprise about this is that it was not done sooner:

Deliveries have been going on for a few weeks, as Cybertrucks have made their way across the state of Texas from Austin to Starbase so they could be included in SpaceX’s fleet of vehicles at the facility.

Interestingly, the Cybertruck uses the same exterior, a stainless steel alloy, as SpaceX rockets. This synergy between the two companies and their very different products shows a very unified mentality between Musk companies.

However, there are some other perspectives to consider as SpaceX is utilizing such a massive fleet of Cybertrucks. Some media outlets (unsurprisingly) are seeing this as a move of weakness by both Tesla and SpaceX, as the aerospace company is, in a sense, “bailing out” lagging sales for the all-electric pickup.

It’s no secret that Tesla has struggled with the Cybertruck this year, and deliveries have been underwhelming in the sense that the company was anticipating between 1 million and 2 million orders for the vehicle before it was widely produced.

A lot of things changed with the Cybertruck between its 2019 unveiling and 2023 initial deliveries, most notably, price.

The price of the Cybertruck swelled significantly and priced out many of those who had pre-ordered it. Some have weighed the option of whether this purchase was a way to get rid of sitting inventory.

However, it seems more logical to consider the fact that SpaceX was likely always going to transition to Teslas for its fleet, especially at Starship, at some point.

It doesn’t seem out of the question that one Musk company would utilize another Musk company’s products, especially considering the Cybertruck has been teased as the vehicle that would be present on Mars.

Continue Reading

Trending