Orbital ATK Cygnus Updates from NASA

An unmanned Atlas 5 rocket blasted off from Florida on Sunday, sending a long-awaited Orbital ATK cargo ship on its way to the International Space Station for NASA.

If the Orbital ATK capsule arrives at the space station Wednesday as planned, it will represent the first USA delivery since spring.

The United Launch Alliance will try again Saturday to launch an Atlas V rocket after poor weather conditions scrubbed Thursday’s and Friday’s launch attempts.

The two private companies – Orbital ATK and SpaceX – contracted by Nasa to deliver supplies to the station, are both stuck with grounded rockets following launch accidents.

Orbital has been out of the station cargo launch business since its Antares rocket exploded seconds after launch on October 28, 2014. “It’s important to have a regular cadence of resupply flights, and we are looking forward to regular resupply to use the station as intended”, said Kirk Shireman, NASA’s program manager of the ISS.

SpaceX has also been working to upgrade its Falcon 9 rocket, which last flew in June, when it blew up about two minutes into flight.

The resupply services contract between NASA and Orbital ATK requires 10 missions to the ISS that would total 63,272 lbs of cargo.

Plus, Cygnus will bring several student experiments on board, five of which first took flight on earlier, failed launches over the past year, along with replacement parts for the space station and added consumables for the crew. After going through a series of safety checks, it will make its final approach before being grappled by one of the station’s robotic arms and guided to a docking berth on the Unity module. “The Atlas V rocket will carry Cygnus into space”.

Due to the launch failures of the past 14 months, the station’s food stockpile had dwindled from NASA’s recommended six-month supply to just a couple of months’ worth of reserves.

The fourth time was the charm, with the Atlas V rocket lifting off at 4:44 p.m. EST and flawlessly ascending through overcast skies.

Today’s launch is the first for the enhanced Cygnus, which carries 53 percent more cargo weight. Boeing intends to use the Atlas V to boost the Starliner capsules it’s building to ferry astronauts to the space station beginning in 2017. This Cygnus is carrying about 7,300 pounds of supplies. Cygnus is also carrying 1,000 kilograms of station hardware, including some spare parts that have also started to drop to low levels on the station.

The blast cost Orbital at least US$200 million in lost equipment and supplies. Normally used for hefty satellite launches, it is the mighty successor to the Atlas used to put John Glenn into orbit in 1962.