It seems like mankind has taken another step towards space exploration, with the recent successful arrival of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule back to the Earth after spending a full week at the International Space Station.
The capsule managed to land safely in the Atlantic Ocean near Florida the morning of March 8th at approximately 8:45 AM EST. The flight known as Demo-1 contained a single occupant— a sensor-packed dummy called Ripley, named after Ripley from the Alien films, who acted as a ‘double’ for real astronauts.
This is a big achievement with regards to space exploration, as none of the Earth’s astronauts have been able to launch off to space from America ever since the NASA space shuttle fleet was discontinued in 2011. With this new development, SpaceX could potentially start another launch, crewed this time, later this year.
If that isn’t special enough, it’s also been almost exactly 50 years since Apollo first landed around the same area on March 13, 1969.
“Fifty years after humans landed on the moon for the first time, America has driven a golden spike on the trail to new space exploration feats through the work of our commercial partner SpaceX and all of the dedicated and talented flight controllers at NASA and our international partners,” says NASA astronaut Anne McClain from the ISS.
