The launch of the American Atlas V rocket with the Cygnus cargo spacecraft from the spaceport at Cape Canaveral (Florida) to the International Space Station (ISS) has been delayed for about a day because of poor weather conditions, NASA representatives said on Friday.
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Cygnus launch that was set to deliver supplies to the ISS was postponed due to bad weather.
The Cygnus is due to carry more than 3,500kg of food, clothing, supplies and science experiments to the space station, including a prototype satellite astronauts will put together like a Lego kit. The last successful US supply run was in April. Orbital ATK bought another company’s rocket, the veteran Atlas V, for this supply mission. Check back here at 4:30PM ET to watch the launch live. Forecasters say there’s only a 30 percent chance the sky will clear Friday. The International Space Station has been programme is a joint programme of the NASA, Russian space agency ROSCOSMOS, Japenese Space agency JAXA, the European Space Agency (ESA), and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).
The weather Friday, however, isn’t looking great for the second launch attempt. The two HoloLens headsets were also in SpaceX’s cargo rocket, which had exploded a few minutes after its launch. A second Cygnus/Atlas V launch will take place next spring from the Cape, followed by the return of operations to NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia later next year aboard an upgraded Antares rocket.
The Dragon’s next flight in June was doomed by a Falcon 9 rocket failure, leaving both of NASA’s commercial cargo providers temporarily grounded while they sorted out their respective accidents.
The first Cygnus spacecraft to visit the International Space Station.
It’s also the United Launch Alliance’s first-ever resupply mission to the orbital outpost.
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The rocket and Orbital ATK Cygnus cargo ship began rolling just after 10 a.m. Wednesday atop a transporter about one-third of a mile from a processing tower to the pad.
