Last month, Northrop Grumman Corp announced that the SS Roger Chaffee Cygnus spacecraft successfully completed its rendezvous with the International Space Station (ISS), marking the company’s 11th successful berthing with the orbiting laboratory (www.northropgrumman.com).

The spacecraft was launched aboard a Northrop Grumman Antares rocket from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport Pad 0A on Wallops Island, Virginia.

As it approached the space station, thruster burns were used to raise its orbit; and once the spacecraft was in close range, crew members on board the ISS secured it with the station’s robotic arm and guided it to the berthing port on the station’s Unity module.

Cygnus, which arrived at the space station with about 3,450kg of cargo, supplies and scientific experiments, will remain docked with ISS for about three months before departing on secondary missions. T

hese include deploying three CubeSats for two commercial customers (using a NanoRacks deployer).

After the CubeSats are deployed, Cygnus will remain in orbit for ‘an extended-duration mission’ designed to demonstrate its capabilities ‘beyond cargo supply and disposal’.

Upon completion of its secondary missions, Cygnus will perform a safe, destructive re-entry into Earth’s atmosphere over the Pacific Ocean.