SpaceX just launched its historic mission to fly NASA astronauts to space
Amid rain and the threat of lightning on Saturday, one of SpaceX's Falcon 9 rockets heaved itself off the ground at 3:22 p.m. ET with a thunderous roar of flames, smoke, and dust.
The launch is not a success yet. This is a dangerous phase of the mission, and it won't be done until the spacecraft reaches orbit, roughly nine minutes after liftoff, if all goes well.The two NASA astronauts inside the ship — Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley — are the first people to launch from US soil since NASA cut its Space Shuttle Program nine years ago.
resurrect the US's capability to launch its own astronauts and kick off a new era of commercial space exploration"This is a dream come true for me and everyone else at SpaceX," Elon Musk, who founded SpaceX in 2002, said shortly before the mission's first launch attempt on Wednesday on NASA TV. "I didn't even dream that this would come true."
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