Billionaire entrepreneur and Tesla owner Elon Musk’s SpaceX blasted off a rocket ship carrying two American astronauts from NASA on Saturday. SpaceX thus became the first private firm to send astronauts to space and hopes to shape the future of commercial space travel.
NASA’s Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken took off at 3.22 pm from the same launch pad that sent Apollo crews to the moon just over 50 years ago.
The rocket has slipped into the orbit safely.
Top takeaways on why SpaceX’s launch is special:
— SpaceX is the first private company to take people to space. Previously, it was done only by US, Russia and China governments.
— This marked the first time American astronauts flew from US soil since the space shuttle programme ended in 2011. It also ended a nine-year dry spell for NASA.
— The astronauts will arrive at the International Space Station on Sunday and stay for up to four months.
— They will come to Earth with splashdown at sea, a process not seen since the 1970s.
— The rockets are reusable and will help make space travel less expensive in the future.
Here’s a live webcast of the astronauts:
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