MIAMI: Orbital ATK’s Cygnus cargo ship arrived at the International Space Station on Wednesday, carrying more than 7,000 pounds of water, food and supplies for global astronauts.

“Capture confirmed,” a NASA commentator said at 6:19 am, as NASA astronaut Kjell Lindgren, operating the Canadian made robotic arm from inside the space station, reached out and grabbed the beer-keg shaped spaceship.

“Cygnus has arrived at the station. “Following the capture, the spaceship will slowly be brought closer to the ISS to be bolted securely on in the coming hours.

The spaceship launched on Sunday from Cape Canaveral Florida atop an Atlas V rocket built by United Launch Alliance.

Orbital has not sent a cargo spaceship to orbit since October 2014, when its Antares rocket exploded shortly after liftoff due to a problem with its Ukrainian-made engine.

Both Orbital ATK and SpaceX have billion-dollar contracts with NASA to supply the ISS over a series of cargo missions with their Cygnus and Dragon spaceships.

Astronauts plan to dive into the contents of the Cygnus and begin unpacking it early Thursday, NASA said.

Published in Dawn, December 10th, 2015