Crew-4 arrive at Kennedy Space Center

ESA astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti arrives at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, USA, with NASA astronauts Kjell Lindgren, Bob Hines and Jessica Watkins. Collectively known as Crew-4, the astronauts flew in from Houston, Texas, and will spend the days ahead in quarantine before being launched to the International Space Station on a SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft.

This is the second long-duration space mission for Samantha who first flew to the orbital outpost in 2014 for her Italian Space Agency ASI-sponsored mission Futura. Her ESA space mission, known as Minerva, will officially begin once she reaches the Station. Samantha will be welcomed on board by fellow ESA astronaut Matthias Maurer and enjoy a short handover in orbit before Matthias returns to Earth as part of Crew-3.
Throughout her mission, Samantha will hold the role of US Orbital Segment (USOS) lead, taking responsibility for all operations within the US, European, Japanese and Canadian modules and components of the Space Station. She will support around 35 European and many more international experiments in orbit.

Stay #Cristofoready for launch updates on social media on twitter by following Samantha and ESA Spaceflight.