By Joe Skipper and Steve Gorman
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Reuters) -NASA and SpaceX postponed the launch of the following long-duration crew to the International Space Station early on Monday, minutes earlier than the rocket was as a result of elevate off, citing an issue with floor techniques used to observe the circulation of an engine-ignition fluid.

Members of the four-man crew – two U.S. astronauts, a Russian cosmonaut and an astronaut from the United Arab Emirates – have since exited the spacecraft and returned to their quarters to await phrase on when the following launch try shall be made, the U.S. house company stated.

The countdown had gave the impression to be progressing easily till about 2-1/2 minutes earlier than launch time, when NASA and SpaceX, the rocket firm based by billionaire Elon Musk, introduced throughout NASA’s dwell webcast that the flight was being scrubbed for the day.

NASA stated engineers determined they wanted to research “an issue preventing data from confirming” the right loading of a liquid chemical referred to as TEA-TEB used to ignite the first-stage rocket engines for launch.

Mission managers have already opted to forgo the following launch alternative early on Tuesday, as a result of an unfavorable climate forecast, NASA stated.

Instead, NASA and SpaceX want to a doable launch window at 12:34 a.m. EST (0534 GMT) on Thursday, although no determination has been made as flight groups proceed working to resolve Monday’s technical glitch, the house company stated.

The SpaceX launch car consisting of a Falcon 9 rocket topped with its Crew Dragon capsule stays in place at Launch Complex 39A of NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, able to fly.

The journey to the International Space Station (ISS), a laboratory orbiting about 250 miles (420 km) above Earth, was anticipated to take about 25 hours, and the astronauts are anticipated to spend six months conducting a variety of science experiments in microgravity.

    Designated Crew 6, the mission marks the sixth long-duration ISS workforce that NASA has contracted to flown aboard SpaceX since Musk’s California-based firm started sending American astronauts to orbit in May 2020.

    The newest ISS crew is led by mission commander Stephen Bowen, 59, a one-time U.S. Navy submarine officer who has logged greater than 40 days in orbit as a veteran of three house shuttle flights and 7 spacewalks.

Fellow NASA astronaut Warren “Woody” Hoburg, 37, an engineer and industrial aviator designated because the Crew 6 pilot, shall be making his first spaceflight.

The Crew 6 mission is also notable for its inclusion of UAE astronaut Sultan Alneyadi, 41, solely the second individual from his nation to fly to house and the primary to launch from U.S. soil as a part of a long-duration house station workforce.

Rounding out the four-man Crew 6 is Russian cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev, 41, who like Alneyadi is an engineer and spaceflight rookie designated as a mission specialist for the workforce.

Fedyaev is the most recent cosmonaut to fly aboard an American spacecraft beneath a ride-sharing deal signed in July by NASA and the Russian house company Roscosmos, regardless of heightened tensions between Washington and Moscow over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The Crew 6 workforce shall be welcomed aboard the house station by seven present ISS occupants – three U.S. NASA crew members, together with commander Nicole Aunapu Mann, the primary Native American lady to fly to house, together with three Russians and a Japanese astronaut.

(Reporting by Joe Skipper in Cape Canaveral and Steve Gorman in Los Angeles; Editing by Will Dunham, John Stonestreet, Gerry Doyle and Nick Macfie)

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