December, tis the season of joy and cheer filling the air with the smell of cakes and pies everywhere. Yes the grim reaper (coronavirus) is still around wielding its deathly scythe reaping souls, leaving scars and misfortune upon those who come in contact. Nevertheless, the fight to rid this untouchable evil has been constant, some in vain but many a victorious effort beckoning others to follow suit, which they exactly did. To name a few, nearly 79 startups turned into unicorns, many others reached remarkable valuation targets, beyond that a lot of companies worldwide made technological breakthroughs and a lot of others digitized their platforms. It is now up to Santa Claus to make his round to every town busting through chimneys delivering gifts, which this year includes a destination unique in his list.

That destination is all the way up in space and Santa is already dashing through the atmosphere on a Falcon 9 rocket with Christmas gifts, goodies and supplies to the International Space Station. This is to celebrate SpaceX’s 100th successful rocket landing that landed upright on an oceans platform and it also happens to be six years to the day when the company accomplished its first booster touchdown.

A New Era Blossoms in Commercial Space Flight

"We're really at the dawn of this new era where we have commercial space flight partners who are flying human beings to low-Earth orbit, who are partnering with us and getting ready to kind of take it over so we can focus on exploration, going to the moon so that we can learn how to go to Mars”, says a cheerful Barron, a Naval Academy graduate and one of the first woman to serve aboard a nuclear submarine.

At 5:07 a.m. EST (1007 GMT), a fresh two-stage Falcon 9 rocket launched from Launch Complex 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center, launching the company's 24th cargo resupply mission to the orbiting lab for NASA. For the crew of Expedition 66 on the station, the Dragon is loaded with more than 6,500 pounds (2,949 kilograms) of consumables, research experiments, and hardware.

The Falcon 9's first stage returned to Earth around eight minutes after liftoff, landing safely on one of SpaceX's drone ships in the Atlantic Ocean. Just Read the Instructions is one of three SpaceX drone ships meant to function as floating landing platforms and return them to port for later reuse.

“There it is! So this is the first landing for this particular booster but the 100th successful landing for an orbital class rocket”, said Andy Train, a SpaceX production supervisor, in a live webcast. “What a way to end off the year”.

 

As the Dragon docks with the space station, NASA astronauts Raja Chari and Tom Marshburn will keep an eye on it. Officials from the Space Force's 45th Weather Squadron forecast unfavorable weather for the mission's first launch attempt on Dec. 21, with cumulus and thick clouds, as well as the electric field rule, being the main worries. Fortunately, Mother Nature cooperated, and the rocket was able to launch on schedule.

A dense cloud layer lingered over the space coast, obstructing sight of the rocket as it ascended to space; nonetheless, the sound of the engines thundered overhead, making for good acoustics. B1069, the first-stage booster used in today's flight, was a first-time flier, having launched for the first time, while its Dragon counterpart had already flown once, as part of the CRS-22 mission earlier this year.

What’s in Santa’s Bag for the Space Crew?

The rocket's first stage returned to Earth after an on-time launch, marking SpaceX's 100th Falcon first stage recovery since the company's first booster was recovered in 2015.

The gumdrop-shaped CRS-24 capsule from SpaceX is the sixth Dragon spacecraft to launch this year, with five of them traveling to and from the International Space Station. (The Inspiration4 crew was launched into space for a three-day mission to orbit the Earth on the other.)

It's loaded with science payloads as well as supplies and snacks for the crew, including holiday favorites like turkey and fruitcake, as well as some Christmas gifts for the astronauts.

“We're going to have some gifts for the crew, and we're going to fly some special food for Christmas dinner”, revealed Joel Montalbano, ISS program manager for NASA. "We have some turkey, green beans, and everyone's favorite fruit cake”.

A range of medical payloads are also onboard, which will aid astronauts as well as people on Earth. Bioprint FirstAid, for example, will show how a handheld gadget can print a Band-Aid using the astronaut's own skin cells. This type of patch can speed up the healing process and help with any wound healing complications that may arise during spaceflight. It also has ramifications on Earth, as it has the potential to enable safer, more flexible healing anywhere on the planet, including in isolated locations.

A Critical Medical Mission for Space Travels

The Host-Pathogen experiment will examine cells obtained from several crew members at various points during the journey to see how microorganisms affect the immune system. The samples will be exposed to both regular bacteria and bacteria that have been exposed to spaceflight by the researchers. This could result in a boost to astronauts' immune systems while in space, as well as more effective therapy for patients with impaired immune systems on Earth.

To better understand how plants adapt to changes in their environments, the Multi-Variable Plant Platform (MVP-Plant-01) will track the development of plant roots and shoots in microgravity. The findings could aid producers in developing more resilient plants that can resist harsh weather changes such as prolonged droughts.

With eight separate cargo ships, five crew trips, and two different space tourist groups, one of which accompanied a Russian film crew, it's been a busy year on station. In addition, two Russian modules were delivered in 2021, as well as a new set of solar arrays to help improve the electricity to the orbiting station, with two more to be placed next year.

“A huge thanks to the ISS team around the globe for what we've been able to accomplish this year”, Montalbano said. “As you know, we work and operate around pandemic constraints and the teams have just been outstanding”.

To maintain such a high launch rate, SpaceX relies on a fleet of reusable rockets. This implies that instead of having to buy a new rocket every time, the company can reuse its recovered boosters. Only two of the 31 launches used brand new rockets, with the remainder using one of SpaceX's flight-proven boosters. The Falcon 9 got a series of enhancements in 2018, as well as a fleet of drone ships to catch the returning boosters.