NASA announces May 27 launch date for SpaceX's 1st launch carrying humans


We'd all like to leave the planet right about now. These two men will actually get to do it.
Two veteran astronauts have been scheduled to depart U.S. soil for the first time in nearly a decade, NASA said in a Friday announcement. Multiple-time spacegoers Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley will take off May 27 in what is also SpaceX's first time carrying humans to the International Space Station.
While American astronauts have made trips into space in the past 10 years, they haven't departed from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida since NASA retired the space shuttle program in 2011. They typically rocketpool with Russian cosmonauts, paying around $83 million for a ride, The Washington Post reports. Hurley was on the last U.S. shuttle mission, and once again, he and Behnken will lift off from the center's pad 39A, which also saw several Apollo and shuttle missions.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
The mission will also be a first for Elon Musk's SpaceX. Its Falcon 9 rocket has ferried supplies to and from the International Space Station, but in May, its manned Dragon spacecraft will carry astronauts as well. A successful launch would be a win over Boeing, which has a contract with NASA to fly crews to the ISS, despite SpaceX's past delays and failures.
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Kathryn is a graduate of Syracuse University, with degrees in magazine journalism and information technology, along with hours to earn another degree after working at SU's independent paper The Daily Orange. She's currently recovering from a horse addiction while living in New York City, and likes to share her extremely dry sense of humor on Twitter.
-
Scottish hospitality shines at these 7 hotels
The Week Recommends Sleep well at these lovely inns across Scotland
By Catherine Garcia, The Week US Published
-
Scientists invent a solid carbon-negative building material
Under the radar Building CO2 into the buildings
By Devika Rao, The Week US Published
-
Crossword: April 1, 2025
The Week's daily crossword
By The Week Staff Published
-
Dark energy may not doom the universe, data suggests
Speed Read The dark energy pushing the universe apart appears to be weakening
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
Pharaoh's tomb discovered for first time in 100 years
Speed Read This is the first burial chamber of a pharaoh unearthed since Tutankhamun in 1922
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
Scientists report optimal method to boil an egg
Speed Read It takes two temperatures of water to achieve and no fancy gadgets
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
Europe records big leap in renewable energy
Speed Read Solar power overtook coal for the first time
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
Blue Origin conducts 1st test flight of massive rocket
Speed Read The Jeff Bezos-founded space company conducted a mostly successful test flight of its 320-foot-tall New Glenn rocket
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
US won its war on 'murder hornets,' officials say
Speed Read The announcement comes five years after the hornets were first spotted in the US
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
Dark energy data suggest Einstein was right
Speed Read Albert Einstein's 1915 theory of general relativity has been proven correct, according to data collected by the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
New DNA tests of Pompeii dead upend popular stories
Speed Read An analysis of skeletal remains reveals that some Mount Vesuvius victims have been wrongly identified
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published