Cheers could be heard in the NASA control room shortly after the SpaceX Mythical snake formed isolated from the Bird of prey 9 rocket.
NASA and Elon Musk's SpaceX
NASA and Elon Musk's SpaceX Mythical snake shuttle lifted off from the Worldwide Space Station on Saturday, carrying four space explorers from four countries on a fruitful flight.
Team 7's mission is narrated by American Jasmin Moghbeli and includes Andreas Mogensen from Denmark, Satoshi Furukawa from Japan and Konstantin Borisov from Russia.
The mythical Snake Shuttle, carried by a Hawk 9 rocket, lifted off at 3:27 a.m. (0727 GMT) from Broadcast Complex 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida in front of about 10,000 individuals gathered to watch the launch.
"We're about to take off!" NASA reported on X, formerly known as Twitter.
Not long after the Mythical Serpent formed isolated from the Hawk 9 missile with the group in a circle, cheers could be heard in the mission control room.
"We could have four team individuals on board from four unique countries ... in any case, we are a unified group with a typical mission," Moghbeli said after the split.
The send-off was pushed back to Saturday to allow the proposals another day to explore part of the natural control and emotional support network of the Group Mythical Beast container, NASA said in a blog post.
It is the primary space mission for both Moghbeli and Borisov.
"That's the thing I've needed to accomplish for as long as I can remember," Moghbeli, a naval aircraft tester, said during a media call a month ago.
"Something that pleases me the most is looking back at our beautiful planet," added the 40-year-old American.
"Every single person I've talked to who's flown so far has said it's been a groundbreaking sight - - plus it seems really fun to drift through space."
Group 7 is slated to be the seventh routine orbital stage mission for Elon Musk's SpaceX, with the primary mission coming in 2020.
NASA is paying SpaceX to manage the taxi as part of a commercial team program it created to reduce reliance on Russian rockets to carry passengers into space after the space shuttle program ended in 2011.
Boeing is another contracted private accomplice, but its program remains buried in delays and specialized challenges. No team has flown yet.
Borisov will be the third Russian to fly on a SpaceX Team Winged snake container mounted on a Bird of prey 9 rocket, AFP reported.
Space remains an unusual area of US-Russia participation despite Moscow's incursion into Ukraine, with the Americans also continuing to fly aboard Russian Soyuz rockets launched from Kazakhstan.
The team will spend half a year aboard the ISS conducting science tests, including collecting tests during a spacewalk, to determine whether the station is releasing microorganisms through its life-supporting mesh vents.
The goal is to understand if microorganisms can properly and duplicate in space.
Another attempt will be planned to explore the physiological contrasts between resting on the planet and in space.
"I assume that I will adapt to each of these commitments. It is an extremely interesting profession: you are planning something that you have not tried at the moment, and you really think that you should do it effectively," said Borisov.
Team 7 will join the seven individuals currently aboard the ISS before the individuals from Group 6 depart for Earth a few days after.
The primary section of the ISS was launched in 1998 and has been continuously occupied by the global team since 2001.
Its operation will continue until at least 2030, after which it will be decommissioned and collide with the sea. Several private ventures are looking into commercial space stations to replace them.
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