WASHINGTON, March 5, 2019 /PRNewswire/ — Media accreditation is open for the launch of Northrop Grumman’s next delivery of NASA science investigations, supplies and equipment to the International Space Station on April 17.

Northrop Grumman‘s Cygnus spacecraft is targeted to launch on the company’s Antares rocket at 4:46 p.m. EDT from Pad-0A of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS) at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility on Wallops Island in Virginia.

To cover prelaunch and launch activities at Wallops, international media without U.S. citizenship must apply for credentials by Friday, March 15. The application deadline for media who are U.S. citizens is Wednesday, April 10. All accreditation requests must be sent to Keith Koehler at keith.a.koehler@nasa.gov.

On this mission, Northrop Grumman will use a new late load capability. Previously, all cargo had to be loaded about four days prior to launch. This new capability will allow time-sensitive science experiments to be loaded into Cygnus just 24 hours before liftoff.

This is the 11th and final Cygnus mission under Northrop’s Commercial Resupply Services (CRS)-1 contract with NASA. The CRS-2 contract begins with a cargo launch in the fall.

Each resupply mission to the station delivers scientific investigations in the areas of biology and biotechnology, Earth and space science, physical sciences, and technology development and demonstrations. Cargo resupply from U.S. companies ensures a national capability to deliver critical science research to the space station, significantly increasing NASA’s ability to conduct new investigations at the only laboratory in space. 

NASA leads human space exploration in low-Earth orbit with commercial and international partners to enable missions to the Moon and Mars. International Space Station missions are a catalyst for economic development and the advancement of scientific knowledge and new technologies that improve our lives.

Get more information about Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus resupply missions at:

https://www.nasa.gov/northropgrumman

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SOURCE NASA