This article is all about SpaceX Dragon capsule and all the information you need,
Table of Contents
What is Dragon Capsule?
Dragon, is basically a spacecraft that is built by the American cooperation company that is created by SpaceX, the company founded by Elon Musk. This is the first private space craft that carry astronauts to the earth’s orbit.
The first launch of the Dragon Capsules were done on December 8th of 2010 and from this date the establishment of the spacecraft started. The second mission of this space craft was done after 2 years on May 22, 2012 that carried a cargo to the international space station. There, first crew flight was launched on May 30, 2020 and it carried two astronauts with it named Doug Hurley and Robert Behnken to the ISS.
Dragon capsules have a unique structure that is like bell shaped in the forward compartment that is pressurized and a cylindrical rear compartment that is named the Trunk and this is unpressurized.
A pair of solar arrays that gives the power to the space craft are attached and kept joint with the trunk. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration contacted SpaceX for 20 uncrewed Dragon Flights to the International Space Station through the year 2020.
The original Dragon missions were carried and supplanted by Dragon 2 which were further divided into two variants, the first one as Crew Dragon and other one has Cargo Dragon. The crew dragon can only carry out 7 astronauts at the time.
The first fully crew dragon mission was carried with two astronauts that were launched in May 2020, and it was the first fully operational mission, Crew 1 carried four astronauts to the ISS in November 2020.
Now, dragon capsules mission have planned their launch every six months, the next mission will carry cargo the ISS soon this days.
Currently, the cargo dragon capsule mission is kept at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.
How many times SpaceX have launched Dragon Capsules
SpaceX Rocket Falcon 9 have totally launch around 152 rockets over the last 12 years. Out of 152 missions the success that SpaceX have got is 150 having a great success ratio of 98.7% and their one mission was partial success due to its secondary payload was failed and only failure SpaceX have failed in their entire journey.
This totally looks insane, that a company launching 152 missions out of which 150 are successful. This shows that why SpaceX is so trust worthy and becoming number one company.
Let’s now talk about the Dragon launches, since 2012 Space X have launched dragon’s capsules around 20 times. Its first flight was took off on 28th October 2012, they planned around 12 missions earlier but then increase the number of flights 8 more, the last flight that they launched was filed on 2019, and then no dragon flights were assign any job.
Related Articles –
(More on SpaceX Crew-3 Astronauts launch mission for NASA here)
(More on Falcon 9 launch of Dragon and Crew 4 Astronauts here)
(More on SpaceX new AX-1 Private Mission for International Space Station )
How is Dragon SpaceX different from other space shuttles?
There are many reasons that make Dragon Capsule different from other space shuttles.
The Dragon capsule is specially known for the pressurized section that allows transport of cargo and people environmentally sensitive cargo.
Dragon capsules are equipped with Draco thrusters that allow Dragon capsules to maneuverer on the orbit.
It has an 8 super dracos that plays an important role in power in the space craft’s launch escape system.
They have the most powerful heat shield in the world, the quality that this space craft are made up of are totally the best in the world.
Another unique feature of the Dragon capsule it’s is shape, it has a bell shape structure that makes it different from other space craft.
The people who travelled in the dragon capsule and any other capsule said that dragon capsule is quite more comfortable and they really find it easy then other space craft, the only problem that were mention that sometimes the toilets of the dragon capsules don’t work this leads them wearing adult diapers in the space.
Conclusion
To conclude, I should say that dragon capsules were one of the best things that SpaceX found, and the re usability feature of the dragon capsules makes it different from other. They are even reusable in the space and satisfied ISS with their quality.
Dragon capsules will be working back from 2022 and will be used more in the upcoming feature.