SpX CREW-5 LAUNCH TO ISS, Oct 5, 2022, KSC, 12:00 pm ET

Update, October 1: The launch is confirmed for October 5 at 12:00 pm ET.  If launch takes place as scheduled, they will dock at the ISS on October 6 at 4:57 pm ET, with hatch opening approximately 6:42 pm ET and a welcome ceremony at 8:15 pm ET.

The launch and coverage of the mission through docking will air live on NASA Television, the NASA app, and NASA Live.

Update, Sepember 29:  NASA has postponed the launch again, to October 5 at 12:00 pm ET.  Further postponements are possible depending on Hurricane Ian.

Update, September 27: NASA has decided to postpone the launch at least until October 4 at 12:23 pm ET, though additional delays are possible depending on Hurricane Ian.

Update, September 26:  The mission passed its Flight Readiness Review today, but Hurricane Ian could impact the launch date. NASA is waiting to see what happens, but alternative launch dates of October 4, 5, 7, 8, and 9 are available (not October 6). The crew was scheduled to arrive at KSC today, but that has been delayed until the weather situation is better understood.

Update, September 24: The launch time has been refined to 12:46 pm ET.

Update, August 25: The launch date has slipped to October 3, 2022 at 12:45 pm because of traffic at the ISS. NASA had said a couple of weeks ago it might be delayed a few days to provide more separation from the Soyuz MS-22 flight launching on September 21 and the return of the Soyuz MS-21 crew on September 29.

Original Entry: NASA has announced a launch date for the next crew rotation mission to the International Space Station, Crew-5, which will launch on a SpaceX Crew Dragon. Launch is No Earlier Than (NET) September 29, 2022.  The announcement states the launch will take place “after a scheduled Soyuz undocking and launch period from Sept. 16-30” which implies there is some flexibility in the date.

Launch time was not provided in the July 21 blog post.

Crew-5 will be the first flight to include a Russian cosmonaut, Anna Kikina, after the United States and Russia finally completed negotiations on a crew-exchange or seat-swap deal where U.S. astronauts will fly on Soyuz and Russian cosmonauts on U.S. spacecraft on a no-exchange-of-funds basis.

The Crew-5 crew is:

• Nicole Mann (NASA)
• Josh Cassada (NASA)
• Koichi Wakata (JAXA)
• Anna Kikina (Roscosmos)

They will fly on Crew Dragon Endurance, making its second spaceflight (it was also used for Crew-3). The Falcon 9 booster for this mission will be on its first flight.

NASA recently concluded that it is comfortable with “flight-proven” hardware up to five flights.