SpaceX Dragon Freedom spacecraft lifted off at 2137 UTC on Sunday(May 21), atop a Falcon 9 rocket from Pad 39A of NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida.
Aboard are four private astronauts including Peggy Whitson, a former NASA astronaut who was the agency's first female Chief Astronaut and first female commander of the space station, and mission pilot John Shoffner, a businessman and STEAM advocate traveling as a paying customer.
They are joined by Saudi Arabian astronauts Ali AlQarni and Rayyanah Barnawi -- the first woman from that country in space.
