SpaceX Crew-8 was the eighth crewed operational NASA Commercial Crew flight and the 13th overall crewed orbital flight of a

Crew Dragon Dragon 2 is a class of partially reusable spacecraft developed, manufactured, and operated by the American space company SpaceX for flights to the International Space Station (ISS) and private spaceflight missions. The spacecraft, which consi ...

spacecraft. The mission launched on 4 March 2024. The Crew-8 mission transported four crew members to the

International Space Station The International Space Station (ISS) is a large space station that was Assembly of the International Space Station, assembled and is maintained in low Earth orbit by a collaboration of five space agencies and their contractors: NASA (United ...

(ISS). Three

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, US federal government responsible for the United States ...

astronauts, Matthew Dominick, Michael Barratt, and Jeanette Epps, and one

Roscosmos The State Corporation for Space Activities "Roscosmos", commonly known simply as Roscosmos (), is a State corporation (Russia), state corporation of the Russian Federation responsible for space science, space flights, List of space agencies, c ...

cosmonaut, Alexander Grebenkin, were assigned to the mission. The Crew-8 mission was extended to accommodate problems encountered by the

Boeing Crew Flight Test Boeing Crew Flight Test (Boe-CFT) was the first crewed mission of the Boeing Starliner capsule. Launched on 5 June 2024, the mission flew a crew of two NASA astronauts, Barry E. Wilmore and Sunita Williams, from Cape Canaveral Space Force Sta ...

during its mission. The crew outfitted the Crew-8 capsule to accommodate two extra astronauts if an emergency occurred prior to Crew-9 docking on 29 September 2024.

Crew

Mission

Crew-8 was the eighth SpaceX operational mission in the

Commercial Crew Program The Commercial Crew Program (CCP) provides Private spaceflight, commercially operated human spaceflight, crew transportation service to and from the International Space Station (ISS) under contract to NASA, conducting crew rotations between t ...

and the 13th overall crewed orbital flight of a

spacecraft. The mission launched at 3:53:38

UTC Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) is the primary time standard globally used to regulate clocks and time. It establishes a reference for the current time, forming the basis for civil time and time zones. UTC facilitates international communica ...

on 4March 2024 (3March, 10:53:38pm EST, local time at the launch site). SpaceX sent the 50th astronaut on this Crew Dragon launch. The first launch attempt, the day prior was scrubbed at T−03:25:38 due to elevated winds in offshore areas of the flight path.

Launch attempt summary

''Note: times are local to the launch site (

Eastern Daylight Time The Eastern Time Zone (ET) is a time zone encompassing part or all of 23 states in the eastern part of the United States, parts of eastern Canada, and the state of Quintana Roo in Mexico. * Eastern Standard Time (EST) is five hours behin ...

).''

Relocation

To make way for a Boeing Starliner as a part of the planned 6 May 2024

that would dock to the forward port of ''

Harmony In music, harmony is the concept of combining different sounds in order to create new, distinct musical ideas. Theories of harmony seek to describe or explain the effects created by distinct pitches or tones coinciding with one another; harm ...

'', the crew relocated to the zenith port of ''Harmony'' on 2 May 2024, docking to the zenith port at 13:46 UTC. After several delays, Starliner docked on 6 June 2024. successfully launched on 5 June 2024 and docked to the forward port of ''Harmony'' on 6 June.

Support for Starliner CFT

The

mission docked with the ISS on June 6, 2024 after experiencing anomalies with its thrusters. Its crew of two remained on the ISS for an unplanned extended stay, while NASA and Boeing evaluated the problems. NASA decided that the uncertainties were too high to have the crew return to Earth on Starliner, so they sent the Crew-9 mission to the ISS with a crew of two, and the Starliner crew then returned to Earth with Crew-9 in March 2025, while Starliner undocked from the ISS and made a successful uncrewed return to Earth in September 2024. This was necessary, because the ISS has only two IDSS ports shared between Dragon and Starliner. However, each ISS crewmember needs a contingency "lifeboat" in the event of an ISS emergency, and uncrewed undocking of the Starliner would leave its crew without a lifeboat. Therefore, NASA directed the crews to install two extra crew positions in the cargo area of the Crew-8 capsule to provide the lifeboat function after Starliner undocks and before Crew-9 docked. Until Crew-9 arrived, they moved to SpaceX Crew-8, their temporary

emergency evacuation Emergency evacuation is an immediate egress or escape of people away from an area that contains an imminent threat, an ongoing threat or a hazard to lives or property. Examples range from the small-scale evacuation of a building due to a storm ...

spacecraft, and subsequently to Crew-9.

Mission duration

Crew-8 was originally planned to return to Earth in early August after a nominal 180-day mission, but the mission was extended several times. It was extended initially as NASA investigated the CFT situation and again to provide the lifeboat function while Boeing worked to reconfigure Starliner to perform the uncrewed return. The NASA maximum mission time for Crew Dragon is ordinarily 210 days, but NASA extended it to 240 days for this mission. The overlap after Crew-9 arrived was slightly longer than usual to allow time to reconfigure Crew-8 and Crew-9 as the Starliner astronauts moved to Crew-9. The return of Crew-8 was delayed for several additional weeks due to poor weather conditions in the splashdown zones surrounding Florida caused by

Hurricane Milton Hurricane Milton was an extremely powerful and destructive tropical cyclone which in 2024 became the most intense Atlantic hurricane ever recorded over the Gulf of Mexico, tying with Hurricane Rita in 2005. Milton made landfall on the west coa ...

and several other storms. The cumulative delays caused Crew-8 to become the longest Dragon mission.

Landing

Crew-8 undocked from the ISS on 23 October 2024 at 21:05UTC. After a completing 3,760 orbits and traveling nearly , ''Endeavour'' began its entry back into the Earth's atmosphere and splashed down in the

Gulf of Mexico The Gulf of Mexico () is an oceanic basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, mostly surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north, and northwest by the Gulf Coast of the United States; on the southw ...

, near

Pensacola, Florida Pensacola ( ) is a city in the Florida panhandle in the United States. It is the county seat and only incorporated city, city in Escambia County, Florida, Escambia County. The population was 54,312 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. ...

on 25 October 2024 at 07:29:02UTC (3:29:02am EDT, local time at the landing site). During the parachute deploy sequence it was observed that the opening of main parachute was delayed. Additionally drogue debris strikes were observed. The capsule taken aboard the recovery ship . After the crew exited the spacecraft, they were taken into the ship's onboard medical treatment facility for evaluations. After that check-up, NASA flew all of the crew members to the Ascension Sacred Heart Pensacola by helicopter for additional evaluation. One astronaut was hospitalized, but NASA declined to provide the individual's condition or identity. NASA said that the entry and splashdown was normal and the recovery of the crew and the spacecraft was without incident. The astronaut was released from the hospital the following day and was said to be in "good health".

Gallery

Notes

References

{{Orbital launches in 2024 2024 in spaceflight 2024 in Florida March 2024 in the United States SpaceX Dragon 2 SpaceX payloads contracted by NASA SpaceX human spaceflights