Piloting manned space mission

NASA plans to put a pair of astronauts - active-duty Air Force Col. Bob Behnken, 49, of Creve Coeur, Mo., and retired Marine Col. Doug Hurley, 53, of Endicott, NY - at the helm of the first US manned space launch in nine years. The Kennedy Space Center, Fla., launch is tentatively scheduled for May 27. The mission is to dock with the International Space Station (ISS). Both men were test pilots and veterans of space shuttle flights, Endeavour and Atlantis, are to be at the controls of the Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft owned and operated by SpaceX. Hurley was the pilot of Atlantis on the final space shuttle mission in July 2011. Behnken will be the joint operations commander for the mission; and Hurley will be the spacecraft commander, responsible for launch and landing. There are currently three astronauts on the ISS: Russians Anatoly Ivanishin and Ivan Vagner, and NASA astronaut Christopher Cassidy. (Source: Military.com 04/20/20) https://www.military.com/daily-news/2020/04/20/airman-and-marine-will-head-space-first-us-manned-launch-2011.html.