Undocking of Crew Dragon spacecraft with Russian cosmonaut onboard from ISS delayed again

WASHINGTON. Oct 16 (Interfax) - The undocking of SpaceX's Crew Dragon-8 spacecraft carrying a crew of three U.S. astronauts and Roscosmos cosmonaut Alexander Grebenkin from the International Space Station (ISS) to return them to Earth has been postponed for a few more days due to bad weather in the splashdown area, NASA said on Tuesday.

The weather conditions in the splashdown area off the coast of Florida remain unfavorable for the return of the Crew-8 mission, NASA said.

NASA managers expect weather to remain bad for the next few days. The next analysis of the weather conditions is scheduled for October 18. If weather improves, NASA and SpaceX would plan the spacecraft's undocking from the ISS no earlier than October 20.

It is now the fifth time the undocking was postponed. It was initially scheduled for October 8 and was later postponed for October 10, 13, 14, and 18 due to a hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico area.

Apart from Grebenkin, the Crew-8 mission includes NASA astronauts Matthew Dominick, Michael Barratt, and Jeanette Epps, who have been on board the station since early March.

After undocking from the ISS, the spacecraft is expected to splash down using a parachute system near Florida's coast in the Gulf of Mexico.