A European cargo
ship the size of a London double-decker bus bid farewell to the International
Space Station late Friday after five months docked at the orbiting laboratory.
The European
Space Agency's (ESA) space freighter Jules Verne, the first of a new fleet of
Automated Transfer Vehicles (ATV), undocked from the station at 5:29 p.m. EDT
(2129 GMT) to begin a leisurely, 23-day descent and destruction.
Named after
the famed 19th Century French science fiction writer Jules Verne, the $1.9
billion (1.3 billion Euros) cargo ship will spend the next several weeks
traveling to the proper orbit to begin its disposal by burning up in the Earth's
atmosphere. The
space freighter launched toward the space station on March 8 and docked in
early April after a series of rendezvous tests to deliver cargo and precious
manuscripts written by its namesake author.
Jules Verne
is 32 feet (10 meters) long cylinder with a width of about 15 feet (4.5 meters)
and hauled almost 8 tons of cargo - three times the amount delivered aboard
Russian Progress spacecraft - to the space station. Since the cargo ship
arrived, station astronauts retrieved its contents, used
its spacious interior as a washroom, used its four rocket engines to boost
the station's orbit and filled the freighter full of unneeded items and trash
for its eventual disposal.
The
spacecraft performed so well, mission managers at a control center in Toulouse,
France, extended its flight by one extra month. Jules Verne is slated to be
destroyed on Sept. 29 when it burns up during reentry over the Pacific Ocean.
"How the
ATV has performed highlights extremely well how the benchmark of European space
technology has been raised, and the wealth of expertise present in European
industry," said Simonetta Di Pippo, ESA's director of human spaceflight, in a
statement. "This bodes well, not only for future ATV missions to the
International Space Station, but also for developments of this kind of
technology that may eventually provide Europe with an autonomous cargo return
capability and independent access to space for European astronauts."
ESA
officials are providing at least five ATV cargo ships to resupply
the space station in return for launch services for its Columbus laboratory
delivered to the space station this year, as well as slots for European
astronauts on future long-duration missions to the orbital research lab.
Jules Verne
is the second cargo ship to leave the space station this week. The Russian
space freighter Progress 29 cast
off from the station on Monday and will reenter the Earth's atmosphere for
disposal next week.
The next
ATV is slated to fly in 2010 and will follow the debut of another space station
cargo ship, Japan's H-2A Transfer Vehicle, set for next year.
"Even
though our schedule has been very busy at the ATV Control Centre, I couldn't
have wished for a better mission," said Herve Côme, ESA's ATV Jules Verne lead
mission director. "And in just over three weeks, we will be looking forward to
the ATV 2 mission in 2010."
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