Four astronauts have pulled up at the International Space Station after launching on an eight-hour express flight that set a United States speed record.

The fresh arrivals include a Canadian whose wife will give birth while he’s away.

SpaceX launched commander Jessica Watkins and her crew for NASA after a three-week delay to fix their Dragon capsule’s leaking fuel system.

Thick clouds threatened to halt the countdown but in the end, the skies cleared enough to allow for a safe liftoff.

Although their stay at the ISS will last six months, the flight there was the quickest yet not only for Elon Musk’s company, but any American entity, including NASA. The space station’s convenient location when the astronauts launched enabled the fast transit.

.@NASA is streaming live coverage of the @SpaceX Crew-13 mission approaching the station for a docking at around 7 p.m. EDT today. More… https://t.co/SzNWNjH5wd pic.twitter.com/KgNwxkCTw6

— International Space Station (@Space_Station) October 1, 2026

With the late morning liftoff from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Watkins became the first Black woman to lead a crew to orbit. A geologist who worked with NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity a decade ago, she is making her second trip to the space station following a lengthy stay in 2022.

“Thanks for an amazing ride,” she radioed following liftoff.

The others are newcomers to space: NASA’s Luke Delaney, a retired Marine; Canada’s Joshua Kutryk, a colonel in the Royal Canadian Air Force; and Russia’s Sergey Teteryatnikov, a former submariner.

They will replace four astronauts who have been living at the orbiting laboratory since February.

This was the 13th crew launched by SpaceX for NASA, not counting 2020’s test flight. All four embrace their Crew-13 designation that pays homage in their mission patch to Apollo 13, the harrowing 1970 moonshot that ended with the astronauts’ safe return.

Kutryk will become the fourth man to become a father while orbiting Earth. His wife Heather is due to give birth to their third child in late November, and the Canadian Space Agency has promised plenty of support for the entire family when the big day comes.

In 2004, NASA provided a radio link between space station astronaut Mike Fincke and his wife’s delivery room during the birth of their daughter. Five years later, Randy Bresnik, commander of next year’s Artemis III mission, dialed in to his wife’s hospital from orbit.

The happy news travelled more slowly for Austrian astronaut Franz Viehbock. His daughter was born a few hours after he launched to the Soviet Union’s Mir space station in 1991. He was not informed until the next day.

A SpaceX rocket carrying the Dragon launched the Crew-13 mission. Photo: NASA

SpaceX, meanwhile, is on a roll. Three hours after Crew-13 blasted off, SpaceX launched a Falcon rocket from California with more than 100 mini satellites.

Another Falcon was set to soar late Thursday night from Florida, with a classified satellite for the National Reconnaissance Office.

All this comes the same week that the company’s massive Starship reached orbit for the first time.

–AP