Adjourned several times, now successful: At 03:03 German time, the German astronaut Matthias Maurer set off from launch complex 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, USA, to the International Space Station ISS. He travels in a capsule of Elon Musk's private space company SpaceX, which transports cargo and people into space on behalf of the American space agency NASA.
After around 22 flight hours, Maurer and his NASA miters are to dock on Friday, November 12, 2021. With bricklayer on board the crew dragon ship "Endurance" from SpaceX are the astronauts Kayla Barron, Tom Marshburn and Raja Chari. The German should spend around six months at the space station and carry out numerous experiments.
The Crew Dragon started for only the fourth time with humans. The Crew-3 mission is the third with a longer stay in space. Is there a bit of discomfort flying along? "Of course, every new development still has teething problems, but SpaceX was able to gain a lot of experience with their cargo capsule, which hardly differs from Crew Dragon," Maurer said in an interview with "Therefore: I'm not nervous, but of course you have to keep a watchful eye."
The start was originally planned for the last weekend in October. But at first the weather was bad, then there was a "smaller medical problem" at one of the crew members and finally the return of another ISS crew was preferred. Overall, the flight shifted by around ten days.
During his mission called »Cosmic Kiss«, Maurer will carry out more than 100 experiments, 36 of them with German participation. One is the test of a fitness suit with built-in electrodes, which should support muscle building with light electrical impulses.
Matthias Maurer impressed among 8000 candidates
At 51, Maurer is the oldest German space driver on a first flight. The man with a doctorate in materials science left more than 8,000 candidates behind after his ESA application and trained for years to travel to weightlessness. "In the event of cases, we have to be able to help our colleagues," Maurer told the news agency "Very comprehensive". "In extreme cases, we can also repair a tooth filling or pull a tooth."
Maurer is the fourth German on the ISS, which races around the globe once in about 90 minutes at around 28,000 kilometers per hour. Astronauts rave about the view of our planet. At night, cities sparkle as beacons of civilization, during the day oceans glitter. A good dozen nations – in addition to the USA and Russia, especially Europe as well as Japan and Canada – are participating in the ISS. It has been permanently inhabited since 2000 and, despite some shortcomings, is considered a technical feat. (asw)
