NASA / SpaceX - Cots Demo 2 Mission patch.
27 May 2012
The hatch between the newly arrived SpaceX Dragon spacecraft and the Harmony module of the International Space Station was opened by NASA Astronaut Don Pettit at 5:53 am EDT (yesterday) as the station flew 253 miles above Auckland, New Zealand. The hatch opening begins four days of operations to upload more than 1,000 pounds of cargo from the first commercial spacecraft to visit the space station and reload it with experiments and cargo for a return trip to Earth. It is scheduled for splashdown several hundred miles west of California on May 31.
Image above: Expedition 31 Flight Engineers Don Pettit, Andre Kuipers and Joe Acaba discuss Dragon’s mission with reporters during a crew news conference. Dragon is scheduled to spend six days berthed to the station before being detached and released on May 31.
Wearing protective masks and goggles, as is customary for the opening of a hatch to any newly arrived vehicle at the station, Pettit entered the Dragon with Station Commander Oleg Kononenko. The goggles and masks will be removed once the station atmosphere has had a chance to mix air with the air inside the Dragon itself.
SpaceX Dragon spacecraft
This mission is a demonstration flight by Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, as part of its contract with NASA to have private companies launch cargo safely to the International Space Station.
For more information about SpaceX Dragon spacecraft Cost Demo-2 Mission, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/exploration/commercial/cargo/spacex_index.html
Images, Video, Text, Credits: NASA / NASA TV / SpaceX.
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