Cygnus, which is making its maiden voyage to the station, arrived at the ISS on September 29 carrying 1,300 pounds of cargo for the crew on board. It was docked to the station's Harmony Module by ESA Astronaut Luca Parmitano and NASA Astronaut Karen Nyberg. Since then, the Expedition 37 crew living on station have been busy unloading cargo, and filling it instead with waste materials no longer needed on the ISS.
Cygnus Docked to the Harmony Module of the International Space Station credit: NASA |
The Cygnus vehicle was unberthed from Harmony before it was released by the station's Canadarm2 at 12:31 p.m.
Cygnus will spend a short time in low-Earth Orbit before before it is de-orbited for a fiery demise over the Pacific Ocean.
The departure of Cygnus marks the beginning of a period of heavy traffic for the International Space Station. On October 28, just six days after today's events, the European Space Agency's Automated Transfer Vehicle "Albert Einstein" will undock from the station's Zvezda Service Module, after spending more than four months at the orbiting complex.
Expedition 37 crew member Sergey Ryazanskiy working in the Poisk Mini Research Module credit: NASA |
As a result, there will be nine astronauts and cosmonauts aboard station for around four days, before Yurchikin, Nyberg and Parmitano will leave the International Space Station, their home for the past 5 months.
Before they leave, Expedition 37 commader Yurchikin will hand over command of the International Space Station to fellow Russian cosmonaut Oleg Kotov.
The trio will depart on November 11, marking the beginning of the 38th Expedition to the International Space Station.
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