Many citizens around North Central Arkansas may have observed a shooting star followed by a loud boom late Tuesday night.
According to NASA, the SpaceX capsule carrying four passengers after a nine-day trip to the International Space Station. They parachuted into the Gulf of Mexico, just off the Florida panhandle, 12 hours after undocking from the orbiting lab after a nine-day trip to the International Space Station.
The Crew Dragon capsule was seen as it streaked across the southeastern U.S. and made a sonic boom before it splashed into the water.
The four-person crew included former NASA veteran Peggy Whitson and three paying passengers, including pilot John Shoffner and two astronauts from the Saudi Space Commission, Ali al-Qarni and Rayyanah Barnawi.
The team conducted medical research, public outreach and more than 20 experiments, such as how low levels of gravity can produce stem cells, which have the ability to create various other types of cells, and affect human messenger RNA cells, which assist protein synthesis.
This is Axiom Space’s second privately funded human mission to dock at the International Space Station. In April 2022, Axiom flew the first all-civilian mission to the International Space Station. That lasted 17 days, 15 of which were spent at the ISS.
Axiom says these flights help it to “continue to lay the groundwork” to eventually build and operate Axiom Station, which would be the world’s first commercial space station.
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