The orbital spacecraft launches Cygnus ATK atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket from Florida.
WASHINGTON, UNITED STATES: A
cargo ship unmanned took off on Tuesday to the International Space Station on a
resupply run that will also feature an unprecedented fire experiment after the craft
leaves the orbital station.
NASA Orbital partner ATK cargo
ship launched its unmanned Cygnus from Cape Canaveral, Florida, atop a United
Launch Alliance 5 Atlas rocket at 11:05 pm (0305 GMT Wednesday), the start of a
30-minute launch window .
It is expected that Cygnus to
enter orbit about 20 minutes after takeoff and reach the ISS on Saturday, where
he will engage the help of the robotic arm of the station in a process due to
start at 1040 GMT, according to NASA.
The launch will mark the fifth
Orbital supply mission to the orbiting laboratory as part of a $ 1.9 million
with NASA to deliver necessities to the astronauts living in space.
It will be the second since
December, which marked the resumption of the missions of the company after an
orbital rocket Antares filled with thousands of pounds of supplies exploded
seconds after liftoff in October 2014.
Orbital is due to carry out two
resupply missions to the ISS this year for NASA, with the next to take place in
early summer of Wallops Flight Facility of the US space agency in Virginia with
an Antares rocket.
Tuesday’s Launch is the second flight to the
International Space Station on a spaceship Cygnus improved carrying 7,900 pounds (3.6 metric tons) of
supplies to the station - including food, water, clothes for the ISS crew of
six astronauts and the material to support dozens of probes and scientific
research.
Cygnus will remain on the ISS
until May. Loaded with trash and once you're at a safe distance from the
station, then NASA engineers will start a fire inside the capsule to see how
big flames behave in space.
NASA has set small controlled
fires in space in the past, but never tried how big flames react within a space
capsule into orbit.
The Cygnus cargo also includes an
instrument for the first time, allow experts to assess, from space, the
chemical composition of meteors entering the Earth's atmosphere.
The pressure vessel is also
carrying a new 3D printer and another prominent scientist has called Gecko
Pinza, similar to the tiny hairs on the feet of geckos that makes it possible
for sticking to surfaces mechanism.
This technology could be used
someday in the hands and feet of the robots that move along the outside of the
spacecraft to carry out inspections and repairs.
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