NASA and SpaceX are making final preparations for Crew-8’s flight to the International Space Station (ISS) in a launch targeted for Thursday night.

The early part of the mission, including the liftoff, return of the first-stage Falcon 9 booster, and stage separation, will be live streamed by NASA. A live audio feed between Mission Control and the crew aboard the Crew Dragon capsule will also be part of the stream. Read on for full details on how to watch.

The Crew-8 launch will carry NASA astronauts Michael Barratt, Matthew Dominick, and Jeanette Epps, as well as Roscosmos cosmonaut Alexander Grebenkin, to the ISS about 250 miles above Earth. This is Barratt’s third space mission, while the other three are heading to orbit for the first time.

The crew will live and work aboard the orbital outpost for about six months before returning to Earth aboard the same Crew Dragon capsule.

Crew-8 is the eighth crew rotation mission of SpaceX’s human space transportation system — and its ninth flight with astronauts when you include the historic Demo-2 test flight in 2020 — to the space station through NASA’s Commercial Crew Program.

SpaceX's Crew-8 ahead of launch.
Crew-8, from left to right: Roscosmos cosmonaut Alexander Grebenkin, and NASA astronauts Michael Barratt, Matthew Dominick, and Jeanette Epps. SpaceX

How to watch

The Crew-8 mission will launch from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, with NASA and SpaceX targeting 12:04 a.m. ET on Friday, March 1 for liftoff — that’s 9:04 p.m. PT on Thursday, February 28.

NASA’s live stream of the event will begin about four hours earlier, at 8 p.m. ET (5 p.m. PT). You can watch the coverage using the player embedded at the top of this page, or via NASA’s YouTube channel.

NASA will also live stream the docking, which is targeted for Saturday, March 2, at 7 a.m. ET (4 a.m. PT), with coverage starting two hours prior.

Be sure to check SpaceX’s social media feed for any late changes to the schedule that could be caused by technical or weather issues.

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