The private spaceflight company SpaceX is counting down to the launch of a landmark delivery flight for NASA today (Feb. 18), a mission that will leave Earth from the same site used by the first Apollo moon landing crew. If all goes well, SpaceX will also land its rocket booster at another pad nearby. <br /> <br />oday's liftoff, which is scheduled for 10:01 a.m. EST (1501 GMT), will be a historic one for sure. It is SpaceX's first Falcon 9 rocket flight from the historic Launch Pad 39A here at the Kennedy Space Center under a lease the company has with NASA. Pad 39A is best known as the launch site for the Apollo 11 mission, which sent the first humans to the surface of the moon, as well as numerous space shuttle missions. <br /> <br />"This pad would have just sat here and rusted away in the salt air, had we not had the use agreement with SpaceX," Bob Cabana, a former NASA astronaut and current director of NASA's Kennedy Space Center said during a news conference. <br /> <br />"What an awesome use of a great American asset," he explained. "I've got to admit, I'm a little partial Pad A. All four of my flights went off this pad." <br /> <br />The NASA cargo is packed up in a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft, which will be launched atop a Falcon 9 rocket. The cargo capsule is loaded with nearly 5,500 lbs. (2,500 kg) of crew supplies and science investigations, including a batch of Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (aka MRSA), which will be used to help scientists develop new medicines to treat antibiotic resistant organisms. The cargo capsule is also carrying a crew of live mice, "mousetronauts" if you will, that are part of a study on how microgravity affects wound healing.
