World News for Students of English

27-05-2020 07:00

For the first time in almost a decade, astronauts are going to space on a US rocket. NASA and the company SpaceX are taking the company’s module to the International Space Station, ISS.

NASA astronauts, Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken, are the first US astronauts to go to space in a private US company’s rocket. This is a major step in NASA’s partnership with private companies, and it is the start of commercial space flights.

When the spacecraft is in orbit, the astronauts will test its control system, the displays and manipulation, and then, it will attach to the ISS. The astronauts will become members of the ISS crew, and their stay is expected to last from one to four months. When it is time to return to Earth, the module will parachute down into the Atlantic Ocean.

Difficult words: module (a part of a spacecraft where the crew stays and that separates from the spacecraft), orbit (the path that an object takes around a planet or sun), manipulation (the controls to move or adjust the spacecraft).

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