Credits: NASA/Patrick Black
NASA and Northrop Grumman are targeting 5:56 p.m. EDT, Tuesday, Aug. 10, for the company’s 16th commercial resupply services mission to the International Space Station. Live coverage of the launch from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Wallops Island, Virginia, will air on NASA Television, the NASA app, and the agency’s websitebeginning at 5:30 p.m. NASA also will hold a prelaunch news briefing Monday, Aug. 9.
Loaded with more than 8,200 pounds of research, crew supplies and hardware, Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus cargo spacecraft will launch on the company’s Antares rocket from Virginia Space’s Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport.
The Cygnus spacecraft, dubbed the SS Ellison Onizuka in honor of the first Asian American astronaut, will arrive at the space station Thursday, Aug. 12. At about 6:10 a.m., Expedition 65 NASA astronaut Megan McArthur will capture Cygnus with the station’s robotic arm, and ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Thomas Pesquet will support her. After Cygnus capture, mission control in Houston will send ground commands for the station’s arm to rotate and install the cargo spacecraft on the Earth-facing port of the station’s Unity module.
Cargo resupply from U.S. companies ensures a national capability to deliver critical science research to the space station, significantly increasing NASA’s ability to conduct new investigations at this laboratory in space. Each resupply mission to the station delivers scientific investigations in the areas of biology and biotechnology, Earth and space science, physical sciences, and technology development and demonstrations. This Cygnus carries experiments that demonstrate 3D printing with dust, use engineered tissue to study muscle loss, and analyze growth of slime mold.
Cygnus also will carry a new mounting bracket that astronauts will attach to the port side of the station’s backbone truss during a spacewalk planned for late August. The mounting bracket will enable the installation of one of the next pair of new solar arrays at a later date.
Complete coverage of launch activities is as follows:
Monday, August 9
1 p.m. – Prelaunch News Conference
- Joel Montalbano, manager, International Space Station Program
- Kirt Costello, chief scientist, International Space Station Program
- Frank DeMauro, vice president and general manager, Tactical Space Systems, Northrop Grumman
- Kurt Eberly, director, Space Launch Programs, Launch and Missile Defense Systems, Northrop Grumman
- Brittany McKinley, Wallops Range Antares Project Manager
Media can submit questions during the prelaunch press conference by emailing Grey Hautaluoma at [email protected].
Tuesday, August 10
5:30 p.m. – Launch coverage begins for lift off at 5:56 p.m.
Thursday, August 12
4:45 a.m. – Rendezvous coverage begins
6:10 a.m. – Capture of Cygnus with NASA astronaut Megan McArthur operating the space station’s robotic arm
8 a.m. – Cygnus installation operations coverage
The Cygnus spacecraft is scheduled to remain at the space station until November when it will depart the station, disposing of several tons of trash during a fiery reentry into Earth’s atmosphere.
Learn more about Northrop Grumman’s 16th commercial resupply services mission at:
https://www.nasa.gov/northropgrumman
Rod Washington: Rod is a blogger, writer, filmmaker, photographer, daydreamer who likes to cook. Rod produces and directs the web series, CUPIC: Diary of an Investigator. He also produces news and documentary video projects. Check out his podcast StoriesThisMoment at https://m3e.d71.myftpupload.com/stm-tncn-podcasts/
