Farewell to ESA's ATV-3 Edoardo Amaldi: Greetings to ATV-4 Albert Einstein

ATV Albert Einstein arriving by boat at Europe’s Spaceport, in Kourou, French Guiana on 19 September 2012.

It is scheduled for launch to the International Space Station in April 2013.

Credits: ESA/CNES/Arianespace/Optique Video du CSG

ESA's third Automated Transfer Vehicle Edoardo Amaldi undocked from the Space Station on 28 September and completed the final part of its six-month servicing mission to the Station by reentering the atmosphere on 3 October and burning up as planned over an uninhabited area of the southern Pacific ocean.

ATVs perform all manoeuvres, including docking autonomously, under close surveillance by their control centre in Toulouse, France run jointly by ESA and CNES.

ATV Edoardo Amaldi and the International Space Station firing their thrusters to boost the orbital outpost’s orbit. 

This shot was captured by ESA astronaut André Kuipers during his PromISSe mission.

ATV-3, Edoardo Amaldi docked with the Interntional Space Station on 29 March 2012 during André’s six-month PromISSe mission.

The cargo ship delivered 6596 kg of fuel, air, oxygen, scientific equipment, spare parts and crew supplies.

While docked, the ATV-3 performed nine reboosts to keep the Space Station in orbit, counteracting the effects of atmospheric drag.

Without reboosts by ATV and Russia’s Progress vehicles, the Station would eventually fall back to Earth.

On 22 August, ATV-3’s eighth boost lasted for 40 minutes (nearly half an orbit) and raised the Station to new heights – a record-breaking 405 x 427 km above Earth.

During the six months that ATV-3 spent at the Station, it provided 48 cubic metres of extra space for the astronauts. Before its departure, the crew loaded its pressurised module with waste material.

ESA's ATV-3 Edoardo Amaldi: Cargo Ship Leaves Space Station

The European Space Agency's ATV-3 Edoardo Amaldi supply ship is seen undocking from the International Space Station on Sept. 28, 2012, in this still image from a video camera on the station.

CREDIT: NASA TV

On Friday, the ATV-3 spacecraft, which is named the Edoardo Almadi after the famed late Italian physicist of the same name, made a flawless departure from the station.

It will spend the next few days orbiting Earth before being intentionally destroyed on Tuesday (Oct. 3) by burning up in Earth's atmosphereover the Pacific Ocean.

"Today, everything has worked to perfection," NASA spokesman Rob Navias said during the agency's live broadcast of the undocking.

The ATV-3 spacecraft was built by the European Space Agency and delivered 7.2 tons of food, water and other vital supplies to astronauts aboard the International Space Station when it launched in March from a South American spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana.

The ATV-3 spent 184 linked to the space station before being packed with trash and other unneeded items for its eventual fiery demise in Earth's atmosphere.

ESA ATV Edoardo Amaldi undocking from ISS, postponed

The undocking of ATV-3, Edoardo Amaldi, from the International Space Station late last night was postponed due to an incorrect command.

During operations ATV-3 performed perfectly in line with its pre-defined measures.

A new attempt to undock will likely be made on Thursday, pending approval by the board of the Station management team this afternoon.

Meanwhile, ATV Edoardo Amaldi is safe and in a dormant mode. Watch the ATV-3 Mission Video here.

The issue was discovered by the Space Station crew shortly before undocking, when they attempted to send a command from a control panel to ATV-3.

Receipt of the command was not confirmed by ATV-3, so the undocking was suspended.

Experts from ESA, NASA and Roscosmos have determined that the problem was caused by commands being sent using the wrong spacecraft identification number.

Power and data links had already been disconnected between ATV-3 and the Station to prepare for the departure. Afterwards, they were re-established by controllers at ESA’s ATV Control Centre in Toulouse, France.

“The joint ESA/CNES mission operations team reacted professionally and skilfully to this unexpected delay,” said Massimo Cislaghi, ESA’s ATV-3 Mission Manager.

“Engineers immediately set to work to reschedule the undocking and reconfigure ATV-3 into safe mode while we and our international partners were troubleshooting the issue.”

ATV Edoardo Amaldi performed perfectly during the undocking procedure and is standing by for the next attempt.

Operational considerations will now postpone ATV-3 reentry to at least 2 October.

Why is ATV-3, Edoardo Amaldi, prepared for undocking today?

During today's EVA-31 by Russian cosmonauts Gennady Padalka & Flight Engineer Yuri Malenchenko, the ПхО compartment (PkhO: Transfer compartment Переходный Отсек Perekhodnyi Otsek).

The PkhO connects three of the Russian ISS modules and is used for docking – will be de-pressurised.

As a result, the Russian Service Module (SM – to which ATV is attached) will be isolated and unmanned; all hatches in the Russian segment of the ISS are being closed for today's EVA.

Since ATV must at all times be able to perform an off-nominal undocking, it was necessary to prepare Edoardo Amaldi for undocking in the unlikely event that an automated undocking (i.e. without crew intervention, since no one will be in the SM) were to become necessary during the 14-hour period of hatch closure.

This is simply a precaution because there is no reason why ATV-3 should undock; the preparations are purely based on ISS flight rules.

During today's spacewalk (set to start at 16:40 CEST and run ~6.5hrs), two of the ISS crew will be in the Russian Poisk (Russian: По́иск; 'Search') module, also known as the Mini-Research Module 2, two will be in US segment and two will be out on EVA.