Crew Dragon Demo-1 (officially Crew Demo-1, SpaceX Demo-1, or Demonstration Mission-1) was the first orbital test of the

Dragon 2 Dragon 2 is a class of partially reusable spacecraft developed and manufactured by American aerospace manufacturer SpaceX, primarily for flights to the International Space Station (ISS). SpaceX has also launched private missions such as Ins ...

spacecraft. This first spaceflight was an uncrewed mission that launched on 2 March 2019 at 07:49:03 UTC, and arrived at the

International Space Station The International Space Station (ISS) is the largest modular space station currently in low Earth orbit. It is a multinational collaborative project involving five participating space agencies: NASA (United States), Roscosmos (Russia), JAXA ...

on 3 March 2019, a little over 24 hours after the launch. The mission ended following a successful splashdown on 8 March 2019 at 13:45:08 UTC. During a separate test, on 20 April 2019, the capsule used on Crew Demo-1 was unexpectedly destroyed when firing the SuperDraco engines at Landing Zone 1.

Mission

The spacecraft tested the approach and automated docking procedures with the

(ISS), consequent undocking from the ISS, full

re-entry Atmospheric entry is the movement of an object from outer space into and through the gases of an atmosphere of a planet, dwarf planet, or natural satellite. There are two main types of atmospheric entry: ''uncontrolled entry'', such as the entr ...

splashdown Splashdown is the method of landing a spacecraft by parachute in a body of water. It was used by crewed American space capsules prior to the Space Shuttle program, by SpaceX Dragon and Dragon 2 capsules and by NASA's Orion Multipurpose Crew ...

and recovery steps to provide data requisite to subsequently qualify for flights transporting humans to the ISS. Life support systems were monitored throughout the test flight. The capsule was planned for re-use in an in-flight abort test, but it was destroyed in an accident during a static fire test of its

SuperDraco SuperDraco is a hypergolic propellant rocket engine designed and built by SpaceX. It is part of the SpaceX Draco family of rocket engines. A redundant array of eight SuperDraco engines provides fault-tolerant propulsion for use as a launch escap ...

thrusters. The mission was launched on a SpaceX

Falcon 9 Block 5 Falcon 9 Block 5 is a Reusable launch system#Partial reusable launch systems, partially reusable two-stage-to-orbit medium-lift launch vehicle designed and manufactured in the United States by SpaceX. It is the fifth version of Falcon 9 Full Thr ...

launch vehicle contracted by NASA's

Commercial Crew Program The Commercial Crew Program (CCP) provides commercially-operated crew transportation service to and from the International Space Station (ISS) under contract to NASA, conducting crew rotations between the expeditions of the International Sp ...

. Initial plans had hoped to see CCDev2 flights as early as 2015. Demo-1 was eventually slated for no earlier than December 2016, and then delayed several times throughout 2017. The first exact date was published by NASA in November 2018 to be 17 January 2019, but this was delayed until February 2019. The static fire took place on 24 January 2019 and the launch date was set to 23 February 2019. By the end of January 2019, the launch was delayed to no earlier than 2 March 2019 according to a

FCC The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains jurisdictio ...

filing by SpaceX for Dragon 2 capsule telemetry, tracking, and command. Demo-1 passed its Flight Readiness Review (FRR) and Launch Readiness Review (LRR) on 22 February 2019 and 27 February 2019 respectively. The Falcon 9 with Demo-1 rolled out to the

LC-39A Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) is the first of Launch Complex 39's three launch pads, located at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Merritt Island, Florida. The pad, along with Launch Complex 39B, were first designed for the Saturn V launch vehicle. Ty ...

on 28 February 2019 at around 15:00 UTC and went vertical a few hours later. The spacecraft was launched on 2 March 2019 at 07:49:03 UTC and successfully docked to the ISS on 3 March 2019 at 10:51 UTC. The Dragon 2 spacecraft successfully undocked from the ISS on 8 March 2019 at 07:32 UTC. The capsule separated from the trunk, performed its de-orbit burn, entered the

Earth's atmosphere The atmosphere of Earth is the layer of gases, known collectively as air, retained by Earth's gravity that surrounds the planet and forms its planetary atmosphere. The atmosphere of Earth protects life on Earth by creating pressure allowing for ...

and splashed down in the

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe ...

about off Florida's east coast later that day at 13:45:08 UTC. The capsule was recovered using SpaceX's recovery ship ''

GO Searcher ''Megan'', formerly called ''GO Searcher'' is a SpaceX Dragon recovery vessel. It is one of the offshore supply ships operated by Guice Offshore. The other identical ship is '' Shannon''. History ''Megan'' is the primary recovery vessel for t ...

'' and was returned to the mainland where it was examined and the data collected by the on board sensors was analyzed.

Payload

Instead of carrying astronauts to the ISS, this flight had an Anthropomorphic Test Device (ATD) wearing SpaceX's custom flight suit. The ATD is named Ripley, as a homage to Sigourney Weaver's character in the ''Alien'' movies franchise. The capsule was weighted similarly to missions with astronauts onboard and carried approximately of supplies and equipment including a "super high tech zero-g indicator" ( a plush toy). The "zero-g indicator" was left on board the ISS after undocking, while Ripley returned safely to

Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's surfa ...

on 8 March 2019.

Gallery

File:NASA Crew Demo-1 (31433487787).jpg, The Dragon 2 at SpaceX's LC-39A Horizontal Integration Facility Crew Demo-1 Mission (46535572784).jpg, C204 launches from Kennedy LC-39A. File:SpaceX Crew Dragon Demo-1 Successfully Docks to Station.jpg, alt=DM1 docked, Dragon 2 docked to the International Space Station File:SpaceX Crew Dragon Demo-1 Hatch Open.jpg, alt=Entering Crew Dragon,

Expedition 58 Expedition 58 was the 58th expedition to the International Space Station, which began on December 20, 2018 with the departure of the Expedition 57 crew. It was commanded by cosmonaut Oleg Kononenko, with astronauts Anne McClain and David Saint-Ja ...

crew members enter the Dragon 2 for the first time. They are wearing protective gear to avoid breathing particulate matter that may have shaken loose during launch.

Notes

References

External links

Crew Demo-1 Mission
press kit (Archive
2 March 2019

Dragon
at

SpaceX Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) is an American spacecraft manufacturer, launcher, and a satellite communications corporation headquartered in Hawthorne, California. It was founded in 2002 by Elon Musk with the stated goal of ...

(Archive
2 March 2019
{{Orbital launches in 2019 SpaceX Dragon 2 SpaceX payloads contracted by NASA Supply vehicles for the International Space Station Spacecraft launched in 2019 Spacecraft which reentered in 2019 Test spaceflights