Cygnus NG-10
NG-10, previously known as OA-10E, was the eleventh flight of the Northrop Grumman uncrewed resupply spacecraft Cygnus and its tenth flight to the International Space Station under the Commercial Resupply Services contract with NASA. The mission launched on 17 November 2018, at 09:01:31 UTC. This particular mission was part of an extension of the initial CRS contract that enables NASA to cover the ISS resupply needs until the Commercial Resupply Services-2 contract enters in effect.
Orbital ATK and NASA jointly developed a new space transportation system to provide commercial cargo resupply services to the International Space Station. Under the Commercial Orbital Transportation System program, then Orbital Sciences designed and built Antares, a medium-class launch vehicle; Cygnus, an advanced maneuvering spacecraft, and a Pressurized Cargo Module which is provided by Orbital's industrial partner Thales Alenia Space. Northrop Grumman purchased Orbital ATK in June 2018, and it was renamed Northrop Grumman Innovation Systems.
History
The COTS demonstration mission was successfully conducted in September 2013, and Orbital commenced operational ISS cargo missions under the Commercial Resupply Service program with two missions in 2014. Regrettably, the third operational mission, Cygnus CRS Orb-3, resulted was not successful due to spectacular Antares failure during launch. The company decided to discontinue the Antares 100 series and accelerate the introduction of a new propulsion. The Antares system was upgraded with newly built RD-181 first-stage engines to provide greater payload performance and increased reliability.In the meantime, the company had contracted with United Launch Alliance for an Atlas V launch of Cygnus CRS OA-4 in late 2015 from Cape Canaveral, Florida, with a second Atlas V Cygnus launch in 2016. The company had planned Cygnus missions for the first, second and fourth quarters of 2016. Two of which flew on the new Antares 230 and one on the aforementioned second Atlas V. These three missions enabled Orbital ATK to cover their initial CRS contracted payload obligation. This particular mission, known as NG-10, is part of an extension program that will enable NASA to cover the ISS resupply needs until the Commercial Resupply Services 2 contract enters in effect, and thus the E indicates that it actually is an extension above the originally contracted payload transport.
Production and integration of Cygnus spacecraft is performed in Dulles, Virginia. The Cygnus service module is mated with the pressurized cargo module at the launch site, and mission operations are conducted from control centers in Dulles, Virginia and Houston, Texas.
Spacecraft
This is the second-to-last of the eleven flights by Northrop Grumman under the Commercial Resupply Services contract with NASA, and it's considered an extension over the originally contracted flights. This will be the seventh flight of the Enhanced sized Cygnus PCM.In an Orbital ATK tradition, this Cygnus spacecraft was named the S.S. John Young. He was the only person to fly twice on each of three NASA programs which included Gemini, Apollo, and the Space Shuttle. John Young died on 5 January 2018 at the age of 87.
Manifest
Total weight of cargo:.- Crew supplies:
- Science investigations:
- Spacewalk equipment:
- Vehicle hardware:
- Computer resources:
After Cygnus leaves the station, the cargo craft will navigate to approximately above the Earth, approximately higher than the space station’s orbit. Slingshot will deploy two satellites, that are expected to stay in orbit at least two years.
In addition, a mounted payload will test SlingShot’s capability to host fixed payloads for an extended period, where the payload uses Cygnus’ power, attitude control and communication capabilities.
After Cubesat deployment and conclusion of attached experiments, Northrop Grumman controllers commanded the spacecraft to a destructive re-entry over the South Pacific Ocean on 25 February 2019.