The space station received a new shipment of supplies this morning (Nov. 5).
A SpaceX Dragon cargo spacecraft laden with 6,000 pounds (2,700 kilograms) of food, equipment and experiments completed docking with the International Space Station (ISS) at 10:04 a.m. EST (1404 GMT), about 11 minutes ahead of schedule.
The spacecraft arrived at the ISS at 9:52 a.m. EST (1352 GMT) while the orbiting complex was flying over southeast Russia, according commentary on NASA+. The spacecraft hatch opening was expected to take place early this afternoon EDT, the commentary added.
SpaceX launched the robotic Dragon aboard a Falcon 9 rocket on Monday night (Nov. 4) from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, for a ride to the ISS. It’s the 31st commercial resupply mission for SpaceX on behalf of NASA and is therefore known as CRS-31.
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The Dragon docked at the forward port of the space station’s Harmony module, which was occupied with another Dragon spacecraft until recently. Four astronauts moved their Crew Dragon to a different parking spot on the ISS during an hour-long event on Sunday (Nov. 3) to make room for the new arrival.
CRS-31 includes several new experiments targeting investigations such as the solar wind, or the constant stream of charged particles from our sun, as well as investigations about plant growth in microgravity, cold welding of metals and how radiation in space influences the weathering of various materials, according to NASA.
CRS-31 is expected to remain docked at the ISS for about a month. When it departs, it will leave with a new load of research and cargo to splash down off the coast of Florida.
This story was updated at 10:15 a.m. EST with news of the successful docking.
