Dragon CRS-13 arrives at ISS

On Dec 15, 2017 a Falcon 9 rocket version 1.2 was launched en route to the International Space Station carrying the Dragon CRS-13.
This rocket was unique, in the sense that the first stage showed traces of reentry from a previous mission. The First stage was the reused Core #35 from the CRS-11 mission. Photos from SpaceX also showed vertical stripes along the length of the first stage. This was an indication that the welding joints of the first stage had to be cleaned and inspected before launch.
The Second or Upper stage was cleaned but the US flags still had the signs or reentry from mission CRS-11.

A recent tweet from Chris B at NASASpaceflight says: “for all future flights, all proven Falcon 9 boosters will remain sooty (bar the stripes from the inspection of the welds)”.

This details on the model were based on photos from SpaceX at Flickr.

As is customary with all my ISS updates, I am using my ISS 1:100 scale paper model and the Dragon CRS-13 paper model.

The following photos demonstrates the capture of the Dragon capsule.

On Dec 17, 2017 Dragon CRS-13 approached the ISS and was captured by the station’s robotic arm.

Dragon as seen from the ISS on its approach.

Canadarm2 ready for capture.

Drago capsule is closing in. Notice the small ISS logo next to the hatch. This indicates that this capsule had a previous visit to the station during CRS-6 mission.