US Cargo Spacecraft Cygnus Released from ISS

The US cargo spacecraft Cygnus was released from the International Space Station (ISS) on 8^th February.

About Cygnus

• The Cygnus is an American automated cargo spacecraft developed by Orbital Sciences.
• It is built and launched by the Northrop Grumman (an American global aerospace and defense technology company).
• It is part of NASA’s Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) developmental program. The COTS is a NASA program started in 2006 that coordinates the delivery of crew and cargo to the International Space Station by private companies
• The departure of Cygnus is a part of Expedition 58

About the International Space Station (ISS)

• The ISS is a habitable artificial satellite in LEO or Low Earth Orbit
• With its first component being launched into orbit in 1998, its first long-term residents started arriving since 2000
• The ISS has to be serviced time to time by various spacecrafts : Soyuz and Progress (Russian); Dragon and Cygnus (American), H-II Transfer Vehicle and Space Shuttle (American spacecraft that has been retired in 2011); Automated Transfer Vehicle (European spacecraft that retired in 2014)
• These aircrafts bring cargo and astronauts to the ISS in proper time interval.

About the Expedition 58

• It is the 58^th Expedition of the ISS
• On December 3, 2018, cosmonaut Oleg Kononenko (commander) and astronauts Anne McClain and David Saint-Jacques (flight engineers) were launched to the ISS onboard the Soyuz MS-11 spacecraft.
• Numerous science and research studies have been carried out including the Refrabicator.
• The Refabricator is the first-ever 3D printer and recycler that will be integrated into a user-friendly machine which will be installed in the ISS. It will recycle waste plastic and previous 3D parts into high-quality filament or 3D printer “ink”