NASA TV Covers Station Crew Launch Live Saturday on Apollo 50th – Space Station

NASA TV Covers Station Crew Launch Live Saturday on Apollo 50th – Space Station

NASA TV Covers Station Crew Launch Live Saturday on Apollo 50th

The Expedition 60 crew (left) is launching 50 years to the day Apollo 11 astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin first stepped foot on the Moon.

At the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, teams are making final preparations for the launch of NASA astronaut Andrew Morgan, Luca Parmitano of ESA (European Space Agency) and Alexander Skvortsov of the Russian space agency Roscosmos to the International Space Station. Their journey to the station will begin with a lift off at 12:28 p.m. EDT Saturday (9:28 p.m. in Baikonur), 50 years to the day that astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin stepped on the Moon in a giant leap for humanity.

Live launch coverage will begin Saturday at 11:30 a.m. on NASA Television and the agency’s website.

The three will join NASA astronauts Nick Hague, Christina Koch and Expedition 60 Commander Alexey Ovchinin of Roscosmos.

The Expedition 60 crew will spend more than six months conducting about 250 science investigations in fields such as biology, Earth science, human research, physical sciences, and technology development. Work on the unique microgravity laboratory advances scientific knowledge and demonstrates new technologies, making research breakthroughs that will enable long-duration human and robotic exploration of the Moon and Mars.

Some of the investigations they will conduct are sponsored by the U.S. National Laboratory on the space station, which Congress designated in 2005 to maximize its use for improving quality of life on Earth. Highlights of upcoming investigations the crew will facilitate on the orbiting laboratory in the unique microgravity environment include the growth of moss aboard the station, a platform to attempt successful printing of biological tissues and bio-mining in space.

Below is the crew’s launch timeline in EDT: