The American astronauts Zena Cardman and Mike Fincke, the Japanese Kimiya Yui and the Cosmonaut of Roscosmos Oleg Platonov took off on Friday morning from the Kennedy space center in Florida, their capsule being mounted on a Falcon 9 rocket.
This is the eleventh crew rotation mission to the ISS within the framework of the NASA Crew commercial program, created to succeed the era of the space shuttle by associating with private industry.
During its six-month mission, CREW-11 will simulate aluning scenarios that could occur near the Lunar South Pole within the framework of the Artemis program led by the United States to return to the Moon. They will also test the effects of gravity on the ability of astronauts to pilot spacecrafts, including future lunar landing.
In constantly inhabited since 2000, the flying laboratory that is the ISS serves as an essential test bench for research on space exploration, in particular concerning any missions to Mars.
CREW-11 also holds on the edge of the fruit, armenia grenades, which will be compared to a control batch that remained on earth in order to study the influence of microgravity on cultures growth.
