Mission type ISS resupply COSPAR ID 2014-003A Mission duration 41 days, 12 minutes | Operator Orbital Sciences SATCAT no. 39502 Spacecraft Cygnus 2 | |
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Cygnus CRS Orb-1, also known as Orbital-1, was the second flight of the Orbital Sciences Cygnus unmanned resupply spacecraft, its second flight to the International Space Station and the third launch of the company's Antares launch vehicle.
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Spacecraft
Orb-1 was the first of eight contracted flights by Orbital Sciences under NASA's Commercial Resupply Services program. This was the maiden flight of the Castor 30B second stage.
Orbital Sciences continued its naming of Cygnus spacecraft in tribute to former astronauts. This vehicle was named the C. Gordon Fullerton for the NASA astronaut who died on 21 August 2013.
Launch and early operations
The launch of Orb-1 was scheduled for November 2013, but a series of delays pushed the date to 20 December UTC. The Antares launch vehicle rolled out from the Wallops Horizontal Integration Facility (HIF) on the morning of 17 December, and was later erected at Launch Pad 0A. Later that day, due to the need for a series of spacewalks to fix a faulty coolant system on the space station, NASA directed Orbital to stand down the Antares rocket. Antares was rolled back to the HIF and time-sensitive cargo removed. The launch date was rescheduled for no earlier than 13 January 2014, but was later moved forward to 7 January after a scheduling conflict at Wallops was resolved. The launch was delayed one day due to cold temperatures at the launch site.
NASA Wallops and Orbital Sciences announced the launch attempt on 8 January 2014 was scrubbed due to "an unusually high level of space radiation that exceeded by a considerable margin the constraints imposed on the mission to ensure the rocket's electronic systems are not impacted by a harsh radiation environment." Orbital later revised this, stating that a more extensive review of the radiation environment found it to be "within acceptable limits" of the Antares program, and that a launch would be attempted on 9 January.
The Orb-1 mission successfully launched on 9 January 2014 at 18:07:05 UTC from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport Launch Pad 0A. Solar array deployment occurred shortly after arriving in orbit. The Cygnus spacecraft arrived at the International Space Station early on 12 January.
The launch was expected to be viewable from South Carolina through Massachusetts and as far west as West Virginia. As with its last couple of launches out of Wallops, Orbital Sciences released viewing information for the Eastern U.S., including maps indicating launch vehicle maximum elevation above horizon and time of first sighting after launch for the various viewing locations.
Payload
Cygnus was filled with 1,261 kilograms (2,780 lb) of supplies for the ISS, including science experiments and hardware to expand the research capability of the station, crew provisions and spare parts. This included 12 experiments flying as part of the Student Spaceflight Experiments Program, selected from 1,466 entrants and involving 7,200 North American students.
A sample of the major experiments focus on:
End of mission
Canadarm2 unberthed the Cygnus spacecraft from the nadir port of the Harmony module on 18 February 2014 at 10:25 UTC. The spacecraft was then maneuvered to a position below the station, where it was released from the RMS at 11:41 UTC. It then performed a series of separation maneuvers to move it away from the station. The spacecraft reentered the atmosphere and burned up on 19 February 2014 over the southern Pacific Ocean, disposing of approximately 1,470 kilograms (3,250 lb) of trash.