Crew Dragon Freedom Docks on Valentine's Day: Love in Low-Earth Orbit | Taha Abbasi

Taha Abbasi marks the Valentine’s Day docking of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon Freedom at the ISS — pairing space exploration romance with routine commercial operations.

Docking on Valentine’s Day

Freedom docked at ~3:15 p.m. Eastern on February 14, 2026. Four astronauts — NASA’s Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway, ESA’s Sophie Adenot, and Roscosmos’s Andrey Fedyaev — began their eight-month mission. There’s something fitting about a mission called “Freedom” arriving on a day dedicated to connection.

Freedom’s Reuse History

Freedom previously flew Crew-4 and Crew-7, making this its third crewed mission. Like Falcon 9 boosters, Dragon spacecraft are designed for reuse. Taha Abbasi draws a parallel to Tesla’s iteration approach: every mission adds to the knowledge base — the third-flight spacecraft is better understood than the first.

International Crew

Jessica Meir (NASA, Commander) participated in the first all-female spacewalk. Jack Hathaway (NASA, Pilot) is a Navy test pilot on his first spaceflight. Sophie Adenot (ESA) is a French helicopter pilot. Andrey Fedyaev (Roscosmos) has previous ISS experience on Crew-6.

Eight Months: The New Normal

Extended duration reflects confidence in Dragon’s long-duration capabilities and complex scheduling logistics. For Taha Abbasi, who tracks frontier technology scaling from experimental to operational, the extended mission is another data point in the normalization of human spaceflight.

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About the Author: Taha Abbasi is a technology executive, CTO, and applied frontier tech builder. Read more on Grokpedia | YouTube: The Brown Cowboy | tahaabbasi.com