NASA and SpaceX Crew-7 launch delays

(CNN) — NASA and SpaceX have decided to delay the launch of the joint Crew-7 mission to the International Space Station scheduled for early Friday morning, the space agency said in a post on its blog.

The spacecraft was scheduled to lift off from Kennedy Space Center at 3:50 a.m. EST on Friday, as part of NASA’s Commercial Crew program that pays private companies to fly astronauts to the station.

The launch is now scheduled for Saturday, August 26 at 03:27 AM Miami Time.

The reasons for the suspension were not immediately disclosed and the weather forecast was favourable.

In a social media post, SpaceX only said that it decided to push back the launch time because it “provides teams additional time to complete and discuss analysis.”

“Vehicles still intact and crew ready to fly,” according to the post shared on X, formerly known as Twitter.

During a live broadcast, NASA spokesman Rob Navias said, “Those responsible for the mission met and decided to delay the Crew-7 launch by 24 hours to allow more time to close some outstanding papers.”

The latest forecast from the US Space Force, which oversees the rocket launches, puts a 95 percent chance that the weather will be favorable for the launch on Saturday.

The crew of the mission that will travel includes NASA astronaut Jasmine Mokbeli, European Space Agency astronaut Andreas Mogensen, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Satoshi Furukawa, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Konstantin Borisov.