The International Space Station (ISS) welcomed four new crewmembers on Saturday.
Three astronauts and a cosmonaut arrived at the orbital laboratory after launching aboard a Falcon 9 rocket from the Kennedy Space Center on Thursday.
As their Crew Dragon approached the space station, a camera aboard the capsule shared a dramatic view (below) of the ISS orbiting Earth at an altitude of around 250 miles.
The orbital outpost is viewed from the @SpaceX Dragon as both spacecraft soar into an orbital sunset. Docking targeted for 2:26am ET today. pic.twitter.com/LMhQOjSkEz
— International Space Station (@Space_Station) August 2, 2025
“That is such a cool view,” one of the SpaceX commentators remarks as the Dragon makes its way toward the docking port on the space station.
The footage also includes a view of the screens inside the Crew Dragon as the capsule’s autonomous systems prepare it for docking with the ISS.
“There’s a great illustration in the middle of that screen where the line kind of swooshes around — that’s the Dragon spacecraft — and it needs to get to the top of that circle representing the ISS before it can properly align itself to the docking access and get ready to close in for those final few moments before the docking itself,” explains another commentator.
The orbital facility is described by NASA as “larger than a six-bedroom house with six sleeping quarters, two bathrooms, a gym, and a 360-degree view bay window.” To put it another way, the station is 356 feet (109 meters) end-to-end, one yard short of the full length of an American football field, including the end zones.
For the last 25 years, crewmembers have been living and working aboard the station, which travels at a speed of five miles per second, orbiting our planet every 90 minutes or so.
NASA and its Russian counterpart, Roscosmos, sometimes send crewmembers onto the outside of the ISS to carry out upgrades or maintenance work, which in recent years has included the installation of new solar panels to increase the efficiency of the station’s power supply.
SpaceX’s newly arrived Crew-11 will stay aboard the ISS for about the next six months before returning home in the same Crew Dragon.
