Category Archives: Space Station

An Orbital Sciences Antares rocket carrying a commercial Cygnus cargo ship loaded with supplies bound for the International Space Station stands poised on the launch pad at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport at Wallops Island, Va. Orbital Sciences

Last Updated Oct 27, 2014 9:30 PM EDT

Launch of an Orbital Sciences Antares rocket carrying a commercial cargo ship bound for the International Space Station was scrubbed Monday evening after a sailboat strayed into the off shore danger zone southeast of the Virginia launch site.

Liftoff from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport at NASA's Wallops Island, Va., flight facility was targeted for 6:45 p.m. EDT (GMT-4), roughly the moment Earth's rotation carried pad 0A into the plane of the space station's orbit.

But as the countdown ticked into its final minutes, range safety officers noticed a boat in the zone where rocket debris could fall in the event of a launch failure. The countdown was held up at the T-minus 12-minute mark and then restarted in hopes the ship would clear the area by the end of the rocket's 10-minute launch window.

But it was not to be, and mission managers reluctantly called off the countdown for the day as the window expired. Engineers were told to recycle the rocket for a second launch attempt at 6:22 p.m. Tuesday. Forecasters predicted good weather.

If all goes well, the Orbital Sciences Cygnus cargo ship perched atop the Antares will catch up with the space station Nov. 2, pulling up to within about 30 feet of the lab complex. At that point, astronaut Reid Wiseman, operating the lab's robot arm, will lock onto a grapple fixture so the capsule can be pulled in for berthing at the Earth-facing port of the forward Harmony module.

"This mission is going to carry over 5,000 pounds of cargo to the crew, a wide variety of items, everything from science to clothes to food, tools, replacement parts, etc.," said Orbital Executive Vice President Frank Culbertson, a former shuttle commander and space station crew member.

The mission is Orbital's third operational space station resupply flight -- the fourth including a demonstration mission -- under a $1.9 billion contract with NASA that calls for delivery of some 44,000 pounds of hardware and equipment to the space station.

SpaceX holds a similar $1.6 billion contract to covering 12 resupply missions.

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Space station cargo ship grounded by wayward sailboat

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. NASA has pioneered new technologies on the International Space Station for years, but the space agency's latest technological twists are venturing into science-fiction territory.

For example, the next generation of camera-equipped, free-flying robots could usher in an age when remote-controlled gizmos check out the space station's far corners, unassisted by humans on board. But couldn't that open the way for a robot to go rogue, as HAL did in "2001: A Space Odyssey"?

"It's our job to make sure that doesn't happen," Jose Benavides, chief engineer for the SPHERES robotic flier program at NASA's Ames Research Center, told NBC News.

Benavides and other researchers provided an update on space station innovations on Monday during a televised forum at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville. SPHERES which is short for for "Synchronized Position Hold, Engage, Reorient Experimental Satellites" ranks as one of the station's longest-running tech experiments.

Astronauts have been testing the gas-propelled, beachball-sized satellites since 2006, but just recently the SPHERES devices have been rigged up with Android smartphones to enhance their vison and intelligence. The station's three spaceballs can now use a Kinect-style 3-D scanning system to map their environment.

Sometime next month, the flying robots are due to venture out of their home base in the Japanese Experiment Module for the first time, Benavides said. Eventually, they'll be given the run of the entire space station.

Suppose Mission Control wants to check out an anomalous reading on one of the space station's displays. "Without having to bother an astronaut, the ground operator can navigate the SPHERES over to take a look," Benavides said.

The robot can also be sent to look for, say, a missing wrench while the astronaut who lost it is otherwise engaged. "A lot of the astronauts' time has been spent looking for things," Benavides explained.

This SPHERES robot has been equipped with a smartphone to enhance its navigational capability. This free-flying robot is propelled in zero-G with compressed carbon dioxide gas, but future free-fliers are more likely to use ducted fans or compressed air.

Meanwhile, Benavides and his teammates spend a lot of their time working through even the most unlikely scenarios for example, a stray gamma-ray blast that somehow scrambles the SPHERES software to make sure a flying robot won't turn into a mini-HAL. "Even if all the wrong things happen, it can't hurt anybody or do any damage," he said.

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To Infinity! NASA Kicks Up Space Station Tech

WALLOPS ISLAND, Va., Oct. 28 (UPI) -- Private space company Orbital Sciences Corp. was set to a rocket a Cygnus cargo ship into space on Monday this week, the latest of NASA's regular International Space Station resupply missions, but the blastoff was postponed until Tuesday after a stray boat drifted into the launch zone.

The company's Anteres rocket ship was scheduled to take off from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility on Wallops Island in Virginia on Monday evening. When a boat appeared downrange of the takeoff site, officials were forced to call off the launch plans.

"This was strictly a range issue this evening that terminated the count just 10 minutes before the scheduled liftoff time at the end of a 10-minute window," NASA TV commentator Rob Navias said during a webcast yesterday.

Engineers will reattempt the launch of the cargo ship on Tuesday night at approximately 6:22 p.m. NASA officials say the launch could be visible, weather permitting, up and down the Eastern Seaboard, from as far south as South Carolina and as far north as Massachusetts. The launch will be broadcast live on NASA TV.

Frank Culbertson, former NASA astronaut and now executive vice president of Orbital Sciences, brushed off any concerns about the pending launch. He congratulated launch team members for their work leading up to the planned liftoff and shrugged off the boat-caused delay.

"That's just spaceflight," Culbertson told Space.com.

Tuesday's launch will be the second of eight launches the company is contracted to carry out for NASA -- an arrangement worth $1.9 billion. Earlier this year, NASA awarded a $1.6 billion contract to SpaceX to launch 12 unmanned resupply missions.

2014 United Press International, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Any reproduction, republication, redistribution and/or modification of any UPI content is expressly prohibited without UPI's prior written consent.

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Space station resupply launch delayed by drifting boat

Dragon Departs the ISS
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Dragon Departs the ISS - Video

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By Marcia Dunn The Associated Press October 27, 2014

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla.

The International Space Station sidestepped a piece of treacherous junk Monday just hours before the planned launch of a supply ship from Virginia.

NASA said debris from an old, wrecked Russian satellite would have come dangerously close to the orbiting lab just two-tenths of a mile if not for the move.

The space station was maneuvered well out of harm's way to keep the outpost and its six inhabitants safe.

Mission Control was informed of the space junk over the weekend. It is wreckage from a Kosmos satellite that was launched in 1993 and collided with an Iridium spacecraft in 2009.

Mission Control said the space station's relocation would not affect Monday evening's scheduled launch of a commercial supply ship.

Orbital Sciences Corp.'s unmanned Cygnus capsule holds 5,000 pounds of cargo for NASA, including 32 mini research satellites, a meteor tracker, and a tank of high-pressure nitrogen to replenish a vestibule used by spacewalking astronauts. Liftoff was scheduled for 6:45 p.m. from Wallops Island, Virginia.

The launch, coming a half-hour after sunset, should be visible along much of the Eastern Seaboard, from South Carolina to Connecticut and Massachusetts. As an added bonus, the space station was to pass overhead five minutes later, resembling a fast-moving star.

Traffic is heavy these days 260 miles up.

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Space station dodging junk from old satellite

4 hours ago by Marcia Dunn

The International Space Station sidestepped a piece of treacherous junk Monday just hours before the planned launch of a supply ship from Virginia.

NASA said debris from an old, wrecked Russian satellite would have come dangerously close to the orbiting lab if not for the move.

The space station was maneuvered well out of harm's way to keep the outpost and its six inhabitants safe.

Mission Control was informed of the space junk over the weekend. It is wreckage from a Kosmos satellite that was launched in 1993 and collided with an Iridium spacecraft in 2009.

Mission Control said the space station's relocation would not affect Monday evening's scheduled launch of a commercial supply ship.

Orbital Sciences Corp.'s unmanned Cygnus capsule holds 5,000 pounds (2,267 kilograms) of cargo for NASA, including 32 mini research satellites, a meteor tracker, and a tank of high-pressure nitrogen to replenish a vestibule used by spacewalking astronauts. Liftoff was scheduled for 6:45 p.m. from Wallops Island, Virginia.

The launch, coming a half-hour after sunset, should be visible along much of the Eastern Seaboard, from South Carolina to Connecticut and Massachusetts. As an added bonus, the space station was to pass overhead five minutes later, resembling a fast-moving star.

Traffic is heavy these days 260 miles (418 kilometers) up.

Just this past Saturday, a Dragon cargo ship supplied by the California-based SpaceX companyits fifthdeparted the space station after a monthlong visit and splashed into the Pacific with a load of precious science samples.

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Space station dodges junk from old satellite (Update)

Orbital Sciences' third formal cargo mission to the International Space Station (ISS) is set for launch early Monday evening, with the potential to provide people along the Eastern Seaboard with one part of a spectacular celestial show, weather permitting.

The launch is slated for 6:45 p.m. EDT from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport on Virginia's Wallops Island. Forecasters anticipate a 98 percent chance that the weather will be just fine for the launch.

It's the first time I've ever seen a 98 percent chance of go from a forecaster, said former NASA astronaut Frank Culbertson Jr., now executive vice president and general manager of the company's advanced programs group, during a pre-launch briefing on Sunday.

Up and down the East Coast, forecasters are calling for partly cloudy or mostly clear skies, allowing people from the Carolinas to southeastern Massachusetts to see portions of the ascent of Orbital's Antares resupply rocket. About five minutes after Antares lifts off, the space station itself will become visible rising from the west-northwest to trace an easterly arc over a crescent moon, with Mars close on its heels as the moon and the red planet set.

Orbital's Cygnus cargo capsule is scheduled to rendezvous with the space station on Sunday.

Ordinarily, cargo missions that Orbital Sciences and Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) loft for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration arrive at the station two to three days after launch. Cygnus, however, will have to loiter for several days some 370 to 740 miles behind the station a testament to how busy the space station has become.

On Saturday, SpaceX's Dragon cargo capsule left the station for a Pacific splashdown after arriving at the station Sept. 23. A European cargo craft, an automated transfer vehicle (ATV), is berthed at the station. A Russian Progress resupply capsule was slated to leave the station Monday, with another scheduled to arrive Wednesday. And the station currently has two Russian Soyuz crew capsules docked to it.

At the moment, this is the closest that low-Earth orbit has to Chicago's O'Hare International Airport.

That's quite a bit of visiting-vehicle traffic, said Gerald Esquivel, NASA's visiting integration manager for the Orbital-ISS missions. Once the Progress capsule leaves on Wednesday, astronauts aboard the station will prepare for Cygnus' arrival.

Cygnus is carrying 2-1/2 tons of science experiments, crew supplies, and hardware to the station including a tank filled with pressurized nitrogen for the station's airlock system. Filled to a pressure of 6,000 pounds per square inch, the three-foot-long tank is the most highly pressurized tank that Cygnus has carried.

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How to watch Antares rocket launch tonight and also see space station