NASA is making final preparations to move the SpaceX Crew Dragon Endeavour spacecraft to a different port at the International Space Station (ISS).
The spacecraft will be moved from the space-facing port of the station’s Harmony module to Harmony’s forward port. The forward port gives the Canadarm2 robotic arm easier access to the roll-out solar arrays that will arrive on SpaceX’s commercial resupply mission in June, NASA said. The solar arrays will eventually be attached to the exterior of the ISS as part of ongoing upgrade work to the station’s power supply.
The relocation flight is scheduled to take place on Saturday and will involve all four Crew-6 astronauts hopping aboard for the ride. NASA will live stream the journey, which is expected to take just 43 minutes.
Crew-6 members Stephen Bowen and Woody Hoburg of NASA, together with Sultan Alneyadi of the United Arab Emirates and Andrey Fedyaev of Russia, will undock at 7:10 a.m. and then attach to Harmony’s forward port at 7:53 a.m.
The four crewmembers worked together on Tuesday to check the pressure suits they’ll be wearing during their short ride inside the Crew Dragon. They also reviewed their relocation procedures, checked vehicle hatches, and prepared the spacecraft cabin, NASA said.
Such vehicle maneuvers are an occasional feature of life aboard the space station. Just last month, for example, three ISS crewmembers rode a Russian Soyuz spacecraft between two ports to make room for a visiting cargo spacecraft. The flight took about 38 minutes. And in July 2021, SpaceX relocated a Crew Dragon to make way for Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft.
How to watch
The repositioning flight will begin at 7:10 a.m. ET on Saturday, May 6, and end at about 7:53 a.m.
NASA’s live stream will begin at 6 a.m. ET. You can watch it via the player embedded at the top of this page, or by visiting NASA’s YouTube channel, which will carry the same feed.
