After a two-and-a-half day cruise to the International Space Station, the NG-13 Cygnus resupply craft from Northrop Grumman has arrived at the orbital outpost with a host of scientific experiments and equipment.<\/p>\n
The arrival comes just 18 days after the previous Cygnus departed the Station and marks the shortest time between two Cygnus missions to date.<\/p>\n
Reflecting on this milestone, Frank DeMauro, Vice President and General Manager of Northrop Grumman\u2019s Space Systems Division, said, \u201cOne of the things NASA asked for was not only to accelerate this launch to early February, but then they wanted NG-12 on board the ISS for as long as possible to obtain as much disposal cargo. <\/p>\n
\u201cAnd because on the last mission we demonstrated the ability to have two Cygnus vehicles in orbit at the same time, this was not an issue.\u201d<\/p>\n
With just 18 days between departure and arrival of two Cygnus spacecraft, the launch-to-launch cadence at just three months was also a new record for Northrop Grumman.<\/p>\n
On the surface, this might not seem significant given other launch providers ability to launch missions just a few days apart from each other.<\/p>\n
But for Northrop Grumman and their Cygnus vehicles, a nominal launch cadence is about once every six months for NASA in terms of resupply of the International Space Station.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n