The BulleTin • Monday, May 3, 2021 A3
SpaceX | Commercial Crew Program
In the Gulf of Mexico, off the coast of Panama City, Florida, support teams
work around the SpaceX Crew Dragon Resilience spacecraft shortly after
it landed in the water, with NASA astronauts Mike Hopkins, Shannon
Walker, and Victor Glover, and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency
astronaut Soichi Noguchi on Sunday morning. NASA’s SpaceX Crew-1
mission was the first crew rotation flight of the SpaceX Crew Dragon
spacecraft and Falcon 9 rocket with astronauts to the International Space
Station as part of the agency’s Commercial Crew Program. Bill Ingalls/NASA
FOUR ASTRONAUTS RETURN
IN RARE NIGHT SPLASHDOWN
BY MARCIA DUNN
AP Aerospace Writer
APE CANAVERAL, Fla. —
SpaceX safely returned four as-
tronauts from the International
Space Station on Sunday, making
the first U.S. crew splashdown in darkness
since the Apollo 8 moonshot.
The Dragon capsule parachuted into
the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Panama
City, Florida, just before 3 a.m., ending the
second astronaut flight for Elon Musk’s
company.
It was an express trip home, lasting just
6½ hours.
The astronauts, three American and
one Japanese, flew back in the same cap-
sule — named Resilience — in which they
launched from NASA’s Kennedy Space
Center in November.
“We welcome you back to planet Earth
and thanks for flying SpaceX,” SpaceX’s
Mission Control radioed moments after
splashdown. “For those of you enrolled in
our frequent flyer program, you’ve earned
68 million miles on this voyage.”
“We’ll take those miles,” said spacecraft
commander Mike Hopkins. “Are they
transferrable?” SpaceX replied that the
astronauts would have to check with the
company’s marketing department.
Within a half-hour of splashdown, the
charred capsule — resembling a giant
toasted marshmallow — had been hoisted
onto the recovery ship, with the astro-
nauts exiting soon afterward. NASA and
SpaceX managers marveled at how fast
and smooth the operation went. The com-
pany’s senior adviser, Hans Koenigsmann,
said “it looked more like a race car pit stop
than anything else.”
C
TODAY
Today is Monday, May 3, the 123rd
day of 2021. There are 242 days left
in the year.
Today’s Highlights in History:
On May 3, 1948, the Supreme Court,
in Shelley v. Kraemer, ruled that
covenants prohibiting the sale of
real estate to Blacks or members of
other racial groups were legally un-
enforceable.
In 1802, Washington, D.C., was incor-
porated as a city.
In 1916, Irish nationalists Padraic
Pearse, Thomas Clarke and Thomas
MacDonagh were executed by a
British firing squad; they were among
16 people put to death for their roles
in the Easter Rising.
In 1937, Margaret Mitchell won the
Pulitzer Prize for her novel, “Gone
with the Wind.”
In 1979, Conservative Party leader
Margaret Thatcher was chosen to
become Britain’s first female prime
minister as the Tories ousted the
incumbent Labour government in
parliamentary elections.
In 1984, Michael Dell founded Dell
Computer Corp. while a student at
the University of Texas in Austin.
In 1987, The Miami Herald said its
reporters had observed a young
woman spending “Friday night and
most of Saturday” at a Washington
townhouse belonging to Democratic
presidential candidate Gary Hart.
(The woman was later identified as
Donna Rice; the resulting controversy
torpedoed Hart’s presidential bid.)
In 1999, some 70 tornadoes roared
across Oklahoma and Kansas, killing
46 people and injuring hundreds.
In 2006, a federal jury in Alexandria,
Virginia, rejected the death penalty
for al-Qaida conspirator Zacarias
Hopkins was the first one out, doing a
little dance as he emerged under the in-
tense spotlights.
“It’s amazing what can be accomplished
when people come together,” he told
SpaceX flight controllers at company head-
quarters in Hawthorne, California. “Quite
frankly, you all are changing the world.
Congratulations. It’s great to be back.”
The 167-day mission was the longest
for a crew capsule launching from the U.S.
The previous record of 84 days was set by
NASA’s final Skylab station astronauts in
1974.
Saturday night’s undocking left seven
people at the space station, four of whom
arrived a week ago via SpaceX.
“Earthbound!” NASA astronaut Victor
Glover, the capsule’s pilot, tweeted after
departing the station. “One step closer to
family and home!”
Hopkins and Glover — along with NA-
SA’s Shannon Walker and Japan’s Soichi
Noguchi — should have returned to Earth
last Wednesday, but high offshore winds
forced SpaceX to pass up a pair of daytime
landing attempts. Managers switched to a
rare splashdown in darkness, to take ad-
vantage of calm weather.
SpaceX had practiced for a nighttime
return, just in case, and even recovered its
most recent station cargo capsule from the
Gulf of Mexico in darkness. Infrared cam-
eras tracked the astronauts’ capsule as it
re-entered the atmosphere; it resembled a
bright star streaking through the night sky.
All four main parachutes could be seen
deploying just before splashdown, which
was also visible in the infrared.
Apollo 8 — NASA’s first flight to the
moon with astronauts — ended with a pre-
Moussaoui, deciding he should spend
life in prison for his role in 9/11; as he
was led from the courtroom, Mouss-
aoui taunted, “America, you lost.”
In 2007, Britain’s Queen Elizabeth
II arrived in Virginia for the com-
memoration of Jamestown’s 400th
anniversary.
In 2009, Mexican President Felipe
Calderon told state television that
a nationwide shutdown and an
aggressive informational campaign
appeared to have helped curtail an
outbreak of swine flu in Mexico.
In 2015, two gunmen were shot and
killed by a police officer in Garland,
Texas, after they opened fire outside
a purposely provocative contest for
cartoon depictions of the Prophet
Muhammad.
Ten years ago: The White House said
that Osama bin Laden was unarmed
when Navy SEALs burst into his room
at his Pakistan compound and shot
him to death, a change in the official
account that raised questions about
whether the U.S. ever planned to
capture the terrorist leader alive.
Chicago’s Derrick Rose became at age
22 the NBA’s youngest MVP. Actor-di-
rector Jackie Cooper died in Santa
Monica, California, at age 88.
Five years ago: In a stunning
triumph for a political outsider,
Donald Trump all but clinched the
Republican presidential nomination
with a resounding victory in Indiana
that knocked rival Ted Cruz out of
the race.
One year ago: In a televised town
hall, President Donald Trump in-
creased his projection for the total
U.S. coronavirus death toll to as
many as 100,000, but insisted that
states could gradually lift lockdowns
and still protect people from the
pandemic. An incursion by a few
dozen Venezuelan military deserters
dawn splashdown in the Pacific near Ha-
waii on Dec. 27, 1968. Eight years later, a
Soviet capsule with two cosmonauts ended
up in a dark, partially frozen lake in Ka-
zakhstan, blown off course in a blizzard.
That was it for nighttime crew splash-
downs — until Sunday.
Despite the early hour, the Coast Guard
was out in full force to enforce an 11-mile
(18-kilometer) keep-out zone around the
bobbing Dragon capsule. For SpaceX’s first
crew return in August, pleasure boaters
swarmed the capsule, a safety risk. Leisure
boats stayed away this time.
Once finished with their medical checks
on the ship, the astronauts planned to hop
on a helicopter for the short flight to shore,
then catch a plane straight to Houston for a
reunion with their families.
“It’s not very often you get to wake up on
the space station and go to sleep in Hous-
ton,” chief flight director Holly Ridings
told reporters.
The astronauts’ capsule, Resilience, will
head back to Cape Canaveral for refurbish-
ment for SpaceX’s first private crew mis-
sion in September. The space station dock-
ing mechanism will be removed, and a
brand new domed window put in its place.
A tech billionaire has purchased the en-
tire three-day flight, which will orbit 75
miles (120 kilometers) above the space
station. He’ll fly with a pair of contest win-
ners and a physician assistant from St. Jude
Children’s Research Hospital, his desig-
nated charity for the mission.
SpaceX’s next astronaut launch for
NASA will follow in October.
NASA turned to private companies to
service the space station, after the shuttle
fleet retired in 2011. SpaceX began supply
runs in 2012 and, last May, launched its
first crew, ending NASA’s reliance on Rus-
sia for astronaut transport.
Boeing isn’t expected to launch astro-
nauts until early next year.
hoping to overthrow the country’s
socialist leadership, backed by a for-
mer U.S. Green Beret, ended in failure
on a Venezuelan beach with six
insurgents dead and two former U.S.
Special Forces soldiers behind bars.
Today’s Birthdays: Actor Alex
Cord is 88. Singer Frankie Valli is 87.
Sen. Jim Risch, R-Idaho, is 78. Sports
announcer Greg Gumbel is 75. Sen.
Ron Wyden, D-Ore., is 72. Pop singer
Mary Hopkin is 71. Singer Christopher
Cross is 70. Rock musician David Ball
(Soft Cell) is 62. Country singer Shane
Minor is 53. Actor Amy Ryan is 53.
Actor Bobby Cannavale is 51. Music
and film producer-actor Damon Dash
is 50. Country musician John Driskell
Hopkins (Zac Brown Band) is 50.
Country-rock musician John Neff is
50. Country singer Brad Martin is 48.
Actor Marsha Stephanie-Blake is 46.
TV personality Willie Geist (TV: “To-
day”) is 46. Actor Christina Hendricks
is 46. Actor Dule Hill is 46. Country
singer Eric Church is 44. Actor Tanya
Wright is 43. Dancer Cheryl Burke is
37. Soul singer Michael Kiwanuka is
34. Actor Zoe De Grand Maison is 26.
Rapper Desiigner is 24.
— Associated Press
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5/31/2021