Ramona Adams
Orbital ATK has concluded its seventh cargo delivery mission to International Space Station as part of the company’s Commercial Resupply Services contract with NASA.
The company said Sunday its Cygnus spacecraft, dubbed S.S. John Glen, also served as a platform for in-space research before the vehicle re-entered Earth’s atmosphere.
S.S. John Glenn was launched atop a United Launch Alliance-built Atlas V rocket at Cape Canaveral, Florida, in April and delivered 7,600 pounds of food, clothing, crew supplies, spare parts, laboratory equipment and scientific experiments to the space station.
Cygnus stayed at the ISS for 44 days then departed the orbiting laboratory on June 4 with approximately 4,300 pounds of items for disposal.
The spacecraft also conducted the Spacecraft Fire Experiment-III; released four CubeSats into orbit to support global ship tracking; and started an experiment to evaluate what happens to a spacecraft during re-entry into Earth.
Saffire-III is the third in a series of tests that Cygnus has performed to explore the effects of microgravity on large-scale fires.
The last experiment also tested the performance of different heat shield materials that could support future space missions, Orbital ATK noted.
