Jane Edwards
Orbital ATK plans to use its Cygnus spacecraft to perform two cargo delivery missions this year to the International Space Station under the first Commercial Resupply Services contract with NASA, NASASpaceflight.com reported Friday.
The ninth ISS cargo supply mission, dubbed OA-9, is set to take off in May aboard the Orbital ATK-built Antares rocket from the Wallops Flight Center in Virginia and will be followed by the OA-10 mission in November.
The 10th cargo resupply mission will also launch from Wallops onboard the Antares vehicle and will stay at the orbiting laboratory for 60 days.
Orbital ATK also plans to carry out the OA-11 mission in early 2019 to complete the flights under the CRS-1 contract.
Frank DeMauro, vice president and general manager of the advanced programs division for Orbital ATK’s space systems group, said the company has begun construction work on the first spacecraft and completed the critical design review phase for the whole system in preparation for the first mission – OA-12 – under the second CRS contract with NASA.
DeMauro noted that the OA-12 mission will fly aboard an Antares rocket from Wallops by 2019, the report added.
