India's ISS dreams will have to wait; Shubhanshu Shukla's journey's new date will be delayed

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: India's eagerly awaited Shubhanshu Shukla's trip to the International Space Station has been postponed again. This is after a fuel leak was detected in SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket, which will carry the Crew Dragon spacecraft into space. The trip was scheduled for 5.30 pm yesterday. This is the fourth time the trip has been postponed.

The new date may be delayed. The reason is that the time it will take to fix the rocket's fault is not certain and a decision has not been made on the new launch window. There are indications that it will be difficult to get a launch window until June 30. The launch window has been granted for the launch of the Russian cargo spacecraft Progress in the first week of July. Axiom mission 4's launch window is expected to be approved in the second week of July.

The launch window is decided taking into account the dates of launches by other countries, the congestion in various orbits in space, temperature changes in the sun, and the trajectories of external objects approaching the Earth, etc. Shubhanshu's fellow passengers are Commander Peggy Whitson, Slavos Wisniewski, and Tibor Kapu.

Postponement and reasons

• May 29 - Preparations not complete.

• June 8 - Adverse weather

• June 10 - Adverse weather

• June 11 - Technical failure