Crew Dragon faces its last big test before human spaceflight on Saturday

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  This is a gallery of stills from an animation of SpaceX's in-flight abort test. [credit: SpaceX ]

Over the weekend, SpaceX performed a static fire test of the Falcon 9 rocket that will launch its Crew Dragon on a key test this coming Saturday. The company is aiming for the top of a four-hour launch window, which opens at 8am ET (13:00 UTC), to conduct its in-flight abort test.

During the test, the Falcon 9 will launch a Crew Dragon spacecraft. Then, at an altitude of about 21km, when the launch vehicle reaches a critical velocity, Dragon's SuperDraco thrusters will ignite for several seconds to pull the capsule away from the rocket-simulating escaping from a rocket emergency.

The test is a critical one. An accident with the SuperDraco system destroyed a Crew Dragon spacecraft test in April, and the company and NASA have since said they have identified the cause of the problem. Approximately 100 milliseconds prior to ignition of Crew Dragon's eight SuperDraco thrusters, a leaking component allowed about one cup of liquid oxidizer (nitrogen tetroxide, or NTO) into the wrong fuel tank plumbing. The company has implemented a fix. Saturday's flight will also showcase the newer parachute system that will bring Dragon safely back down to the ocean.

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