Watch SpaceX launch 5,000 kilos of cargo to the ISS early on Aug. 24

A SpaceX cargo ship laden with 5,000 kilos (2,270 kilograms) of provides will launch to the International Space Station early Sunday morning (Aug. 24), and you’ll watch the motion dwell.

A robotic Dragon capsule is scheduled to raise off atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket on Sunday at 2:45 a.m. EDT (0645 GMT) from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in coastal Florida. The launch will kick off SpaceX’s thirty third mission for NASA’s Commercial Resupply Services program, therefore the flight’s identify: CRS-33.

Coverage will begin roughly 20 minutes earlier than launch. You can watch it right here at Space.com, courtesy of NASA, or via the space agency.

If the launch goes to plan, the CRS-33 Dragon will dock with the International Space Station (ISS) on Monday (Aug. 25) on the ahead port of the Harmony module. Rendezvous protection will start on the identical feeds beginning at 6 a.m. EDT (1000 GMT), with docking scheduled for 7:30 a.m. EDT (1130 GMT).

In the close to future, the Dragon will also do a “reboost demonstration” at the ISS — meaning that it will fire its thrusters to take the space station higher in its orbit. These reboosts are needed periodically because the ISS flies through a thin skein of air molecules while orbiting Earth roughly 250 miles (400 kilometers) up. The resulting drag, slight as it is, requires supply ships to boost the station every now and again so that it can keep operating.

These reboosts have historically been done by Russian Progress spacecraft. But Russia may withdraw from the ISS program as soon as 2028, so NASA has tasked its U.S. cargo ship suppliers — SpaceX and Northrop Grumman, which builds the Cygnus vehicle — to perform reboost demonstrations as supplements. (The ISS is expected to keep operating until late 2030 or early 2031.)

Resupply missions like CRS-33 launch every few months to deliver fresh food, more supplies and equipment, and new science investigations to the astronauts living on board the ISS. And quite a bit is going up on Sunday.

“In addition to food, supplies, and equipment for the crew, Dragon will deliver several experiments, including bone-forming stem cells for studying bone loss prevention and materials to 3D print medical implants that could advance treatments for nerve damage on Earth,” NASA officials said in a statement. “Dragon additionally will ship bioprinted liver tissue to check blood vessel improvement in microgravity and provides to 3D print metallic cubes in house.

The CRS-33 Dragon is anticipated to stay on the ISS till December. Space station astronauts will then load Dragon with cargo and accomplished science experiments for cargo again to Earth, and the spacecraft will splash down within the Pacific Ocean off the California coast.