Of Critical Importance.... Cygnus Is Carrying An Order Of Pizza

After launching at 6:01 p.m. EDT Tuesday from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia, the Cygnus spacecraft’s solar arrays successfully deployed to collect sunlight to power Cygnus on its journey to the station.

The International Space Station's crew welcomed Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus cargo resupply ship Thursday morning. The spacecraft’s arrival brings more than 8,200 pounds of science experiments, crew supplies, and hardware for a future spacewalk (plus an order of pizza).
 
NASA astronaut Megan McArthur used the space station’s robotic Canadarm2 to capture Cygnus upon its arrival early Thursday morning, while ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Thomas Pesquet monitored telemetry during rendezvous, capture, and installation on the Earth-facing port of the Unity module.

The Cygnus spacecraft—named the SS Ellison Onizuka, after the first Asian-American astronaut—launched on an Antares rocket from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia on Tuesday.

This is Northrop Grumman’s 16th cargo flight to the space station and is the fifth under its Commercial Resupply Services 2 contract with NASA. Cygnus launched on an Antares 230+ rocket from the Virginia Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport’s Pad 0A at Wallops.

The Cygnus spacecraft will remain at the space station until November before it disposes of several thousand pounds of trash through its destructive re-entry into Earth’s atmosphere.

FMI: www.nasa.gov