Falcon 9’s launch failure viewed from KSC press site

SpaceX’s eighth operational cargo mission to the International Space Station is set for liftoff with nearly 3.5 tons of research investigations, crew provisions and an experimental expandable habitat for the International Space Station.

Aiming to reduce risk and costs, NASA has decided to launch the first two modules of the Gateway station in lunar orbit on the same heavy-lift rocket in 2023, rather than fly them on separate rockets and dock them together in deep space, according to the the agency’s chief human spaceflight manager.

The introduction of C213 comes years after the other four Cargo Dragon spacecraft currently in service. Ax-4 will be the third human spaceflight mission for SpaceX in 2025.