OA-5, previously known as Orbital-5, was the seventh planned flight of the Orbital Sciences'

uncrewed resupply spacecraft Uncrewed spacecraft or robotic spacecraft are spacecraft without people on board. Uncrewed spacecraft may have varying levels of autonomy from human input, such as remote control, or remote guidance. They may also be autonomous, in which they ...

Cygnus and its sixth flight to the

International Space Station The International Space Station (ISS) is a large space station that was Assembly of the International Space Station, assembled and is maintained in low Earth orbit by a collaboration of five space agencies and their contractors: NASA (United ...

under the

Commercial Resupply Services Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) are a series of flights awarded by NASA for the delivery of cargo and supplies to the International Space Station (ISS) on commercially operated spacecraft. The first phase of CRS contracts (CRS-1) were sign ...

contract with

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, US federal government responsible for the United States ...

. The mission launched on 17 October 2016 at 23:45:36

UTC Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) is the primary time standard globally used to regulate clocks and time. It establishes a reference for the current time, forming the basis for civil time and time zones. UTC facilitates international communica ...

. Orbital Sciences and NASA jointly developed a new space transportation system to provide commercial cargo resupply services to the International Space Station (ISS). Under the Commercial Orbital Transportation System (COTS) program, Orbital 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. The Cygnus spacecraft for this mission is named the S.S. ''Alan Poindexter'' in honor to astronaut Alan G. Poindexter, a deceased

Space Shuttle The Space Shuttle is a retired, partially reusable launch system, reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft system operated from 1981 to 2011 by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as part of the Space Shuttle program. ...

commander. Poindexter was selected in the 1998 NASA Group (G17) and went into orbit aboard Space Shuttle missions

STS-122 STS-122 was a NASA Space Shuttle mission to the International Space Station (ISS), flown by the . STS-122 marked the 24th shuttle mission to the ISS, and the 121st Space Shuttle flight overall. The mission was also referred to as ISS-1E by the I ...

and

STS-131 STS-131 ( ISS assembly flight 19A) was a NASA Space Shuttle mission to the International Space Station (ISS). launched on April 5, 2010, at 6:21 am from LC-39A, and landed at 9:08 am on April 20, 2010, on runway 33 at the Kennedy Sp ...

History

The COTS demonstration mission was successfully conducted in September 2013, and Orbital commenced operational ISS cargo missions under the Commercial Resupply Service (CRS) program with two missions in 2014. Regrettably, the third operational mission,

Cygnus Orb-3 Orbital-3, also known as Orb-3, was an attempted flight of Cygnus, an automated cargo spacecraft developed by United States–based company Orbital Sciences, on 28 October 2014. The mission was intended to launch at 22:22:38 UTC that evening. ...

, was not successful due to spectacular

Antares Antares is the brightest star in the constellation of Scorpius. It has the Bayer designation α Scorpii, which is Latinisation of names, Latinised to Alpha Scorpii. Often referred to as "the heart of the scorpion", Antares is flanked by ...

failure during launch. The company decided to discontinue the Antares 100 series and accelerate the introduction of a new propulsion system. The Antares system is being upgraded with newly built

RD-181 The RD-191 () is a high-performance single-combustion chamber rocket engine, developed in Russia and sold by Roscosmos. It is derived from the RD-180 dual-combustion chamber engine, which itself was derived in turn from the four-chamber RD-170 ( ...

first stage engines to provide greater payload performance and increased reliability. In late 2014, Orbital Sciences contracted

United Launch Alliance United Launch Alliance, LLC (ULA) is an American launch service provider formed in December 2006 as a joint venture between Lockheed Martin Space and Boeing Defense, Space & Security. The company designs, assembles, sells and launches rockets ...

for an

Atlas V Atlas V is an expendable launch system and the fifth major version in the Atlas (rocket family), Atlas launch vehicle family. It was developed by Lockheed Martin and has been operated by United Launch Alliance (ULA) since 2006. Primarily used to ...

launch of

Cygnus CRS OA-4 OA-4, previously known as Orbital-4, was the fourth successful flight of the Orbital ATK uncrewed resupply spacecraft Cygnus and its third flight to the International Space Station (ISS) under the Commercial Resupply Services (CRS-1) contract ...

in late 2015 from

Cape Canaveral Cape Canaveral () is a cape (geography), cape in Brevard County, Florida, in the United States, near the center of the state's Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic coast. Officially Cape Kennedy from 1963 to 1973, it lies east of Merritt Island, separated ...

Florida Florida ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders the Gulf of Mexico to the west, Alabama to the northwest, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the north, the Atlantic ...

, and with a second Atlas V launch of Cygnus in 2016. The company plans three Cygnus missions in 2016, in the first (

Cygnus CRS OA-6 OA-6, previously known as Orbital-6, is the sixth flight of the Orbital ATK uncrewed resupply spacecraft Cygnus and its fifth flight to the International Space Station under the Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) contract with NASA. The missi ...

), third (Cygnus CRS OA-5) and fourth quarters (

Cygnus OA-7 OA-7, previously known as Orbital-7, is the eighth flight of the Orbital ATK uncrewed resupply spacecraft Cygnus and its seventh flight to the International Space Station (ISS) under the Commercial Resupply Services contract with NASA. The m ...

) of 2016. The Cygnus OA-5 and OA-7 will fly on the new

Antares 230 Antares (), known during early development as Taurus II, is an American expendable medium-lift launch vehicle developed and built by Orbital Sciences Corporation (later Orbital ATK and Northrop Grumman) with financial support from NASA ...

and OA-6 will fly on second Atlas V in first quarter of 2016. These three missions enable Orbital ATK to fulfill their CRS contracted payload obligation. This particular mission is known as OA-5. 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 Dulles ( ) is an unincorporated area in Loudoun County, Virginia, United States, and is part of the Washington metropolitan area. The headquarters of Northrop Grumman Innovation Systems and ODIN Technologies, as well as the former headquarters ...

and

Houston Houston ( ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in the U.S. state of Texas and in the Southern United States. Located in Southeast Texas near Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, it is the county seat, seat of ...

Texas Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the we ...

Spacecraft

This was the sixth of ten flights by

Orbital ATK Orbital ATK Inc. was an American aerospace manufacturer and defense industry company. It was formed in February 9, 2015 from the merger of Orbital Sciences Corporation and parts of Alliant Techsystems (ATK). Orbital ATK designed, built, and de ...

under the

(CRS) contract with

. This was the third flight of the Enhanced sized Cygnus PCM. The mission successfully launched on 17 October 2016, 23:45UTC. In keeping with an Orbital ATK tradition, this Cygnus spacecraft is named the S.S. ''Alan Poindexter'' after the NASA astronaut who flew aboard the Space Shuttle twice (2008 and 2010).

Manifest

Total cargo mass on ascent: * Pressurized cargo with packaging: ** Science investigations: ** Crew supplies: ** Vehicle hardware: ** Spacewalk equipment: ** Computer resources: ** Russian hardware: * Unpressurized cargo (CubeSats): * Total cargo on descent (destructive):

Other OA projects

had planned the next Cygnus flight,

Cygnus CRS OA-7 OA-7, previously known as Orbital-7, is the eighth flight of the Orbital ATK uncrewed resupply spacecraft Cygnus and its seventh flight to the International Space Station (ISS) under the Commercial Resupply Services contract with NASA. The m ...

, for 30 December 2016. However, in October 2016, it was announced that OA-7 was being delayed until March 2017 and switched from the

launch vehicle to a

rocket to provide additional cargo up mass for NASA. In 2015, under the NASA CRS-1 contract, Orbital Sciences was awarded three extension flights for 2017 and 2018. The Cygnus CRS OA-8E flight has tentatively been scheduled for 12 June 2017, followed by

Cygnus OA-9E OA-9E was the tenth flight of the Cygnus, an uncrewed resupply spacecraft. The flight was launched by Orbital ATK (OA), which was purchased by Northrop Grumman during the mission. It was the ninth flight under the Commercial Resupply Services ...

later that year and OA-10E in 2018. Cargo vehicle scheduling is dynamic with the ISS partners. The schedule will be influenced by the first USA crewed commercial flights (

SpaceX Space Exploration Technologies Corp., commonly referred to as SpaceX, is an America, American space technology company headquartered at the SpaceX Starbase, Starbase development site in Starbase, Texas. Since its founding in 2002, the compa ...

Boeing The Boeing Company, or simply Boeing (), is an American multinational corporation that designs, manufactures, and sells airplanes, rotorcraft, rockets, satellites, and missiles worldwide. The company also provides leasing and product support s ...

) to ISS since Space Shuttle retirement in 2011.

Cubesat release

On 25 November 2016, after leaving the ISS, the spacecraft raised its orbit to 500 kilometers and released four

Lemur-2 Spire Global, Inc. is a space-to-cloud data and analytics company that specializes in the tracking of global data sets powered by a large constellation of nanosatellites, such as the tracking of maritime, aviation and weather patterns. The comp ...

cubesats for

Spire Global Spire Global, Inc. is a space-to-cloud data and analytics company that specializes in the tracking of global data sets powered by a large constellation of nanosatellites, such as the tracking of maritime, aviation and weather patterns. The comp ...

References