Supply Craft Launchiung to Space Station Today

Today, the Cygnus spacecraft will be carried by an Atlas V rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Space Launch Complex 41, toward the International Space Station. NASA reset the launch time to 6:25 p.m. and scrubbed it just before 6:15 p.m. The next opportunity is at 5:33 p.m. (2233 GMT) on Friday. “The rocket and spacecraft have a 30-min window to be able to launch and meet up with the (ISS) in orbit”. (Cygus will fly atop an Atlas V until a revamped version of Antares is ready to go.) The launch will initiate the fourth of eight resupply missions Orbital ATK is flying under a $1.9 billion contract with NASA. The Cygnus spacecraft is received an upgrade: “The cargo freighter now features a greater payload capacity, new UltraFlex solar arrays and new fuel tanks”. After arriving at the station, station crew members Scott Kelly and Kjell Lindgren will use the station’s robotic arm to capture Cygnus.

United Launch Alliance is looking forward to roll its 12th and final rocket of the year this week to a Cape Canaveral Air Force Station launch pad.

“Here at the Kennedy Space Center, we are continuing to help develop the Orion crew vehicle, and support the Space Launch System rocket with exploration ground systems that will one day send astronauts on trips beyond low-Earth orbit”, he said. The cargo craft has been packed with 7,000 pounds of NASA supplies, science equipment and research bound for the ISS.

“Right now we are focused on the success of this mission and getting the cargo to the space station”.

In the wake of the failure, Orbital managers made a decision to discard the 1970s-era Russian engines used in the five Antares rockets launched to that point and to replace them with state-of-the-art RD-181 engines, also built in Russia. Orbital employees are now working hard to swap out the engine of its Antares rocket and get the thing up and running again, despite the fact that this actually is, you know, rocket science: One wrong tweak could see the Antares rocket once again become an expensive firework display on the launchpad during Orbital’s next scheduled launch in March 2016. “Cygnus will remain attached to the station for approximately two months…once Cygnus departs the station, it will safely reenter the atmosphere over the Pacific Ocean”.

Orbital’s latest cargo ship, named Cygnus for the swan constellation, contains food, clothes, equipment, science experiments and even storybooks, part of an astronaut-reading project for children.