SpaceX's Dragon Carrying NASA Cargo Resupplies Space Station

At 2:31AM PT, Dragon C4 capture is by Canadarm2

The Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) Dragon spacecraft was berthed to the International Space Station at 8:56 a.m. EST Sunday. The delivery flight was the second contracted resupply mission by the company under NASA's Commercial Resupply Services contract. 

Space station Expedition 34 crew members Kevin Ford and Tom Marshburn of NASA used the station's robotic arm to successfully capture Dragon at 5:31 a.m. The capture came one day, 19 hours and 22 minutes after the mission's launch. The station was 253 miles above northern Ukraine. Following its capture, the spacecraft was installed onto the Earth-facing port of the Harmony module through ground commands issued by mission control at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston. 


The Dragon spacecraft lifted off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida at 10:10 a.m. Friday aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. Shortly after spacecraft separation from the rocket's second stage, the Dragon lost three of its four thruster pods. Solar array deployment was delayed while SpaceX engineers worked to purge blocked valves and get the pods back online. Ninety minutes after launch, Dragon's arrays were deployed. By 3 p.m., all four thruster pods were online and attitude control was regained. 

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