Q&A with Keith Gendreau, principal investigator of the first X-ray space communications experiment (members only)

The NASA manager overseeing development of Boeing and SpaceX’s commercial crew ferry ships says the space agency has approved SpaceX’s proposal to strap in astronauts atop Falcon 9 rockets, then fuel the launchers in the final hour of the countdown as the company does for its uncrewed missions.

Riding nearly a million pounds of thrust, NASA astronaut Chris Cassidy and Russian crewmates Anatoly Ivanishin and Ivan Vagner rocketed into orbit April 9 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome en route to the International Space Station.

A Soyuz rocket is standing on a launch pad at the Vostochny Cosmodrome in Russia’s Far East for liftoff Sunday with the next 36 satellites for OneWeb’s internet network, the sixth Soyuz mission dedicated to the commercial broadband constellation.