Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus spacecraft, launched last Monday, November 7, has just reached the International Space Station and was captured by the Canadarm2 robotic arm. Astronaut Nicole Mann, assisted by her colleague Josh Cassada, will soon begin the slow maneuver to move the Cygnus until it docks with the Station’s Unity module after about two hours.
Confirmation arrived that the Mengtian module successfully completed docking maneuvers with the Chinese Tiangong space station’s Tianhe core module. Mengtian was launched about 13 hours earlier from the Wenchang base on a Long March-5B rocket. A few hours after docking, the Shenzhou-14 mission taikonauts, as the Chinese call their astronauts, entered the new module. This success represents the completion of the first phase of the Chinese space station construction, as now it’s formed by the core module Tianhe and two laboratories after the Wentian reached orbit on July 24.
A few hours ago, the Progress MS-21 spacecraft docked with the International Space Station in the mission also referred to as Progress 82 or 82P. The Russian cargo spacecraft, which blasted off last Wednesday, October 26, Russian time, carries food, water, scientific experiments, fuel, and various hardware.
A few hours ago, SpaceX’s Crew Dragon Endurance spacecraft docked with the Harmony module of the International Space Station completing the first part of its Crew-5 or SpaceX Crew-5 mission that began with its launch about 29 hours earlier. After checking that the pressure was properly balanced, the hatch was opened to allow Koichi Wakata, Nicole Mann, Josh Cassada, and Anna Kikina to enter the Station.
A few hours ago, the Soyuz MS-22 spacecraft was launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan and after a little more than three hours reached the International Space Station with three new crew members on board. It docked with the Station’s Rassvet module. As is becoming increasingly common for crewed trips as well, the ultra-fast track was used which halves the journey duration.
