After almost a week of delay, the commercial cargo capsule of Orbital Sciences finally made it to the International Space Station to drop off the supplies.
The 40-meter long Antares rocket was launched on Sept. 18 off NASA’S Wallops Island Flight Facility in Virginia. The unmanned capsule is carrying about 680 kilograms of daily living supplies including food and care packages.
“Family members were allowed to load personal things for the crew members," Frank Culbertson, a former astronaut and executive vice president at Orbital, said in NASA TV. "It is usually books or DVDs or letters, that sort of thing — and usually some snacks."
It was expected to arrive to the orbiting space station on Sept. 22 but didn’t make it due to a reported software problem.
The controllers based in Virginia noticed that the capsule is slowing on its track due to a discrepancy between the ISS and the Cygnus navigation systems. A software patch was uploaded and was able to resume the cargo capsule on its track on Thursday.
Finally, the space capsule arrived Saturday 6:00 a.m CDT in the ISS and was welcomed by six crews from NASA and the European Space Agency. As the cargo capsule approached the station, flight engineers Luca Parmitano and Karen Nyberg worked in capturing the capsule using the Mission Control. Cygnus pointed a tracking laser at the space station and released its robotic arm 10 meters before it reached the docking station.
“Cygnus capture complete,” said Parmitano.
The crew will eventually move Cygnus to a berthing area. It will be attached there for a month before it sets out to another journey to return to Earth. As soon as it returns to Earth, Cygnus will officially become the second commercial cargo capsule which will be another option of NASA other than SpaceX. Orbital Sciences is under a $1.9 billion contract with NASA.
Cygnus is the first spacecraft to rendezvous in the orbiting space station. It made 10 maneuvers without a problem.
