SpaceX will launch its 30th cargo mission to the International Space Station for NASA this afternoon (March 21), and you can watch it live.
A Falcon 9 rocket carrying an uncrewed Cargo Dragon spacecraft is scheduled to lift off today at 4:55 p.m. EDT (2055 GMT) from Space Launch Complex-40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.
The mission, known as CRS-30, will be the first cargo launch from SLC-40 since March 2020. Since then, the pad has been outfitted with a new launch tower, which allows for more efficient cargo loading and upgrades the facility to support crewed launches as well.
NASA’s broadcast of the CRS-30 launch will begin Thursday at 4:35 p.m. EST (2035 GMT on March 21), and will be available here at Space.com.
Related: SpaceX to launch 30th cargo mission to the ISS for NASA this week
Before the SLC-40 upgrades, “we loaded cargo while the vehicle was still horizontal using a mobile cleanroom before we would take the vehicle vertical for lunch, but thanks to this new state of the art crew tower, required for our human spaceflight missions, that late-load cargo operation got a massive upgrade, too,” Sarah Walker, director of SpaceX Dragon mission management, said during a pre-launch press briefing on Tuesday (March 19).
“It’s much easier to load a huge complement of time-critical NASA science into our Dragon spacecraft in the flight orientation,” she added.
Assuming a smooth liftoff, Falcon 9’s first-stage booster will carry the spacecraft to the edge of space before stage separation and a series of retrograde burns will bring the rocket back for a vertical touchdown at SpaceX’s Landing Zone-1, at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.
Following a successful orbital insertion by Falcon 9’s second stage, the CRS-30 Cargo Dragon will spend around two days en route to the ISS, with a rendezvous and docking scheduled for Saturday (March 23).
Over 6,000 pounds (2,721 kilograms) of scientific supplies, maintenance equipment, two new coffee kits, fresh fruits and vegetables and other food for the station’s inhabitants are stowed aboard Dragon on CRS-30. Included in that haul is a new spare pump stored in Dragon’s trunk, which will be integrated into the space station’s external thermal loop system.
In addition to materials to support ongoing research aboard the orbital laboratory, a number of new science investigations are also aboard CRS-30 to enrich our understanding of the effects of microgravity on a range of biological and technological processes.
The Nano Particle Haloing Suspension experiment, for example, will study nanoparticles’ reaction to electrical fields, and their use to help synthesize semiconductor material known as “quantum dots,” which holds the potential to greatly increase the efficiency of solar panel technology.
The Multi-resolution Scanner (MRS) experiment will utilize the existing autonomous Astrobee robots aboard the ISS to test 3D mapping technology. “The team has big plans for future applications [of this technology] in spaceflight,” said Heidi Parris, associate program scientist at NASA’s ISS Program Research Office. “If it works well inside the ISS, this technology could be developed to use for scanning of exterior hull damage on the ISS or other space stations, as well as lunar and Martian surface scanning.”
Parris highlighted a number of other investigations during Tuesday’s press call as well, including the APEX-09 experiment to examine the genetic makeup of plants in microgravity.
CRS-30 “is also going to launch research into many, many other areas, including cellular microbiology, crystal growth, astrophysics, human research, material science and much more,” Parris said.
CRS-30 will remain docked to the Harmony module’s zenith (upward-facing) port for about a month before deorbiting and returning to Earth. Dragon is the only cargo vehicle currently able to withstand reentry forces through Earth’s atmosphere, and it’s therefore used to return a number of research materials and other spent items from the space station.
The other two currently operational cargo vehicles — Northrup Grumman’s Cygnus spacecraft and Russia’s Progress vessel — are designed to burn up upon reentry.
Weather for Thursday’s launch looks good, with only a 15% chance of violation, according to Melody Lovin, launch weather officer with Cape Canaveral Space Force Station’s 45th Weather Squadron. A backup launch window is available on Friday ( March 22); however, weather conditions that day are expected to deteriorate significantly.