Space Exploration: US launches unmanned "commercial" Cygnus cargo ship to ISS

Orbital Sciences Corp launched the first flight of its unmanned Cygnus cargo ship Wednesday to the International Space Station, as NASA forges ahead with its plan to privatize US space missions.

"This is just the beginning of what we can do to support human space flight," Orbital executive vice president Frank Culbertson, a retired NASA astronaut, told reporters after Cygnus went into orbit around the Earth.

The Cygnus capsule, hitched to Orbital Science's Antares rocket, blasted off at 10:58 am (1458 GMT) from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility off Virginia's eastern coast, for a Sunday rendezvous with the ISS.

At the orbiting outpost, the Exhibition 37 crew watched live video of the blast-off.

NASA released a photo showing Commander Fyodor Yurchikhin and Flight Engineers Karen Nyberg and Luca Parmitano suspended due to the loss of gravity as they gathered around a laptop computer screen in the station's Destiny laboratory.

Cygnus will ferry about 1,300 pounds (590 kilograms) of food, clothing and other cargo for the crew aboard the space station, which it is scheduled to reach at 1130 GMT Sunday.

"Today marks a milestone in our new era of exploration as we expand the capability for making cargo launches to the International Space Station from American shores," NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said in a statement 
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Commercial Space flight: SpaceX grows up: ISS test on April 30 key to next step

SpaceX ready for April 30 launch

Less than four years ago, SpaceX had yet to launch a rocket successfully, and founder Elon Musk doubted the company could survive a fourth consecutive failure.

Today, SpaceX is on the verge of an historic attempt to send the first private spacecraft to the International Space Station, after a planned April 30 launch from Cape Canaveral, and has become the face of commercial spaceflight.

Many believe a successful docking to the ISS would represent a paradigm shift in spaceflight operations and validate Musk’s conviction that a small, entrepreneurial company could upset the status quo.“They’re coming in and saying we can do this better, we can do this cheaper, and we’re going to make a go of it,” said Jim Muncy, a space-policy analyst whose clients include SpaceX. “It is absolutely the quintessential American business story.”

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