SpaceX crew reaches space station in record time with Black female commander

Jessica Watkins has become the first Black woman to command a crewed spaceflight, leading a four-person SpaceX team to the International Space Station on Thursday. The crew arrived in seven hours and 55 minutes, a new speed record for a US spacecraft. Watkins, a geologist, previously studied Mars data from NASA's Curiosity rover. This was her second visit to the station, after her first trip in 2022. The mission is SpaceX's 13th crew launch for NASA, and the team leaned into that number. They drove to the launch pad in black Teslas with licence plates reading "Lucky 13", and the mission patch references Apollo 13, the famous 1970 moon mission.