A privately-owned unmanned US space capsule arrived at the International Space Station on Sunday, bringing to the space outpost food, scientific materials and other crucial equipment.
The capsule named Dragon was captured – with the help of a robotic arm – by Nasa Expedition 34 Commander Kevin Ford and Flight Engineer Tom Marshburn, when the ISS was over northern Ukraine, US space officials said.
The craft, owned by SpaceX corporation, will now be inspected via cameras, brought to the earth-facing port of the ISS’s Harmony module and bolted into place by commands from mission control.
The original plan was for Dragon to attach to the space station on Saturday and return to earth on March 25, splashing down in the Pacific Ocean off Mexico’s Baja California peninsula.
But the capsule ran into troubles with its thrusters shortly after launching on Friday from Cape Canaveral, Florida, triggering the delay.
SpaceX engineers found that only one of the spacecraft’s four thruster pods, which help manoeuvre the capsule in orbit, was working. The problems were later fixed.