NASA TV will be busy on Monday with the rendezvous and capture of Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus CRS-15 cargo ship to the International Space Station and an update on the Perseverance Rover on Mars. NASA is promising new imagery and video from the Red Planet. Cameras recorded Perseverance’s descent to Mars. I predict the video will break the Internet. The schedule is below. Watch it all live on NASA TV. Feb. 22, […]

WALLOPS, Va. (NASA PR) — A Northrop Grumman Cygnus resupply spacecraft is en route to the International Space Station with approximately 8,000 pounds of science investigations and cargo after launching at 12:36 p.m. EST Saturday from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. About three hours after launch, the spacecraft’s solar arrays successfully deployed to collect sunlight to power Cygnus on its journey to the space station.

“S.S. Katherine Johnson” ready for liftoff aboard Antares rocket carrying vital supplies and equipment for the crew aboard the station

WALLOPS, Va., February 19, 2021 (Northrop Grumman PR) – Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE: NOC) is set to launch the company’s 15th resupply mission (NG-15) to the International Space Station under NASA’s Commercial Resupply Service-2 contract. The NG-15 mission’s Cygnus spacecraft will launch aboard the company’s Antares rocket with nearly 8,000 pounds of scientific research, supplies and hardware for the crew aboard the station.

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla., February 17, 2021 (CASIS PR) – On Saturday, February 20, no earlier than 12:36 p.m. EST, Northrop Grumman is scheduled to launch its Cygnus spacecraft on an Antares rocket to the International Space Station (ISS), marking its 15th mission under NASA’s Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) program.

The launch, which will take place from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia, will deliver thousands of pounds of critical supplies and research to the space station. Moreover, many of the payloads on this mission showcase the diversity of research sponsored by the ISS U.S. National Laboratory, with investigations in the physical and life sciences, materials research, and the validation of new facilities that further research and development in low Earth orbit.

WALLOPS ISLAND, Va. (NASA PR) — NASA commercial cargo provider  Northrop Grumman is targeting 12:36 p.m. EST Saturday, Feb. 20, for the launch of its 15th resupply mission to the International Space Station. Live coverage of the launch from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility on Wallops Island, Virginia, will air on NASA Television, the agency’s website and the NASA app beginning at 12 p.m. EST Saturday, Feb. 20, with a prelaunch event Friday, Feb. 19.

NASA’s TechEdSat series of technology demonstrations aims to bring small payloads back to Earth or to the surface of Mars – while pushing the state of the art in a variety of CubeSat technologies and experiments.

MOFFETT FIELD, Calif. (NASA PR) — TechEdSat is a series of collaborative projects and missions that pairs college and university students with NASA researchers to evaluate new technologies for use in small satellites, or CubeSats. Students do the hands-on work – designing, building, and testing CubeSat spacecraft systems and analyzing the results – for each flight mission, under mentorship of engineers at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley.

WALLOPS ISLAND, Va. (NASA PR) — NASA is inviting the public to take part in virtual activities and events ahead of the launch of Northrop Grumman’s 15th commercial resupply services mission (NG CRS-15) for NASA. The Antares rocket carrying Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus spacecraft will bring about 8,000 pounds of cargo, science, and supplies to the International Space Station.

The mission’s launch is targeted for 12:36 p.m. EST Saturday, Feb. 20, from the mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport’s Pad-0A at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility on Wallops Island, Virginia.

FALLS CHURCH, Va. (Northrop Grumman PR) — Northrop Grumman is proud to name the NG-15 Cygnus spacecraft after former NASA mathematician Katherine Johnson. It is the company’s tradition to name each Cygnus spacecraft after an individual who has played a pivotal role in human spaceflight. Johnson’s hand-written calculations were critical for John Glenn’s successful orbital mission around the Earth.

Johnson was born on August 26, 1918 in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia. Her parents enrolled her in high school on the campus of West Virginia State College at the age of 10 because their home county did not offer public schooling for black students past eighth grade. Upon graduating from high school at the age of 14, Johnson enrolled at West Virginia State, where she took every math class offered by the school, causing professors to create additional courses just for her.

by Danny Baird
​NASA’s Space Communications and Navigation program office

NASA is developing capabilities that will allow missions at high altitudes to take advantage of signals from Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) constellations — like GPS commonly used in the U.S. These signals — used on Earth for navigation and critical timing applications — could provide NASA’s Artemis missions to the Moon with reliable timing and navigation data. NASA’s Space Communications and Navigation (SCaN) program is developing the technologies that will support this goal.

DULLES, Va., Jan. 6, 2021 (Northrop Grumman PR) – Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE: NOC) announced today that the company has completed the first phase of its 14th cargo resupply mission to the International Space Station under NASA’s Commercial Resupply Mission (CRS-2) contract. Cygnus was released by the station’s robotic arm at 10:11 a.m. ET, carrying more than 4,000 pounds of disposable cargo and will remain in orbit for approximately two weeks for the secondary phase of its mission.