ESA/NASA SOHO: Mercury, Antares, M4 cluster and dwarf planet 1 Ceres

Mercury, Antares, M4 cluster and dwarf planet 1 Ceres in ESA/NASA SOHO/LASCO C3 field of view.

Credit: ESA, Nasa 

Arkyd 3: Asteroid-Mining Tech Among Casualties of Antares Rocket Explosion

Planetary Resources' Arkyd 3 technology-demonstration spacecraft, which was destroyed when Orbital Sciences' Antares rocket exploded on Oct. 28, 2014.

Credit: Planetary Resources

The rocket explosion that destroyed a cargo vessel bound for the International Space Station Tuesday (Oct. 28) also took out an asteroid-mining company's first spacecraft.

Orbital Sciences Corp.'s Antares rocket exploded in a huge fireball just seconds after launching from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia Tuesday evening.

The crash caused no injuries but destroyed Orbital's unmanned Cygnus capsule, which was toting 5,000 lbs. (2,268 kilograms) of food, supplies and other gear to the International Space Station for NASA.

Among Cygnus' cargo was the Arkyd 3 satellite, a tiny technology demonstrator built by asteroid-mining firm Planetary Resources.

The plan was to deploy Arkyd 3 (also known as A3), which measured just 12 by 4 by 4 inches (30 by 10 by 10 centimeters), from the space station into free-flying low-Earth orbit, where it would test out avionics, control and other systems for future asteroid-prospecting spacecraft.

Planetary Resources is taking the loss of A3 in stride.

"While we are saddened about the unfortunate consequences of this launch failure, our own development schedule, budget and plan are practically unaffected," Planetary Resources President Chris Lewicki wrote in a blog post today (Oct. 29).

"In fact, we are already hard at work developing our next test vehicle, the Arkyd 6, which is planned for launch in Q3 2015," he added.

"It will build on the learnings from our development of the A3 and iterate to our next level of design. Multiple spacecraft and safety in numbers is part of our strategy, and we will continue with it for just these occasions."

ISS crew capture Milky Way from orbit

Image Credit: NASA

One of the Expedition 41 crew members aboard the Earth-orbiting International Space Station on Sept. 13, 2014 captured this image of a starry sky.

The white panel at left belonging to ESA's ATV-5 spacecraft, which is docked with the orbital outpost, obstructs the view of Scorpius.

The red star Antares is directly to the left of the bottom of the second ATV panel from the top.

The two stars that are close together and on the lower left of the photo comprise Shaula, the tip of the scorpion’s tail.

The open cluster close to Shaula is M7. The hardware at bottom right is part of one of the station's solar panels.

M7: Open Star Cluster in Scorpius

Orbital Science's Antares Rocket Launch Aborted - Umbilical came loose

Orbital Science Corp will have to wait for another day after an umbilical came loose some 12 minutes before the scheduled launch time on April 17th, 2013.

The Antares rocket is a 13-story-tall booster designed to launch the company's new Cygnus spacecraft on unmanned cargo delivery missions to the International Space Station. Orbital has a $1.9 billion deal with NASA to fly eight cargo flights to the space station under the agency's Commercial Resupply Services program, but first needs to demonstrate that the two-stage Antares rocket is fit for those missions.

With the retirement of NASA's space shuttle fleet in 2011, the space agency is depending on new commercial spacecraft like Orbital's Cygnus to keep the space station stocked with supplies.

NASA eventually plans to use private spaceships to ferry American astronauts to and from the space station as well.

Orbital Sciences is one of two companies with contracts to launch unmanned cargo delivery flights to the space station.

The other is Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) of Hawthorne, Calif., which has a $1.6 billion deal to provide 12 cargo delivery missions using its Falcon 9 rockets and Dragon space capsules.

Orbital Sciences' Antares Rolls Out to Wallops Launch Pad

Orbital Sciences Corporation’s Antares rocket rolls out to the launch pad at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility on the morning of Oct. 1, 2012.

Over the next several months, Orbital plans a hot-fire test of the Antares first stage, the maiden flight of an Antares rocket, and a cargo delivery demonstration mission to the International Space Station as part of NASA’s Commercial Orbital Transportation Services. Credit: Nasa

Orbital Rolls Antares to NASA Pad To Prepare for Hold down Test

Orbital Sciences Corp. on Oct. 1 rolled the first stage of its Antares rocket out to the launch pad at NASA’s Wallops Island Flight Facility to prepare for a series of tests that, if successful, will clear the way for the company to begin routine cargo deliveries to the international space station sometime next year.

Orbital wanted to move the Antares stage to the pad Sept. 27, but a power problem with a transporter vehicle used to haul the rocket from its hangar to the pad, coupled with expectations of foul weather on the Virginia coast during the weekend, prompted the company to delay rollout until Oct. 1, spokesman Barron Beneski said.

Orbital holds a $1.9 billion NASA contract signed in 2008 that calls for eight cargo flights to the space station.

Orbital will deliver that cargo with its unmanned Cygnus space freighter, which Antares will loft to low Earth orbit from Wallops.

Before it can collect on the delivery contract, however, Orbital has to complete a hold-down test of the Antares first stage, then conduct two Antares demonstration flights out of Wallops.

The first-stage hold-down test will take place at the pad sometime in the next four to five weeks, Orbital said in its Oct. 1 press release.

In the hold-down test, the rocket core’s two liquid engines — Soviet-vintage NK-33s refurbished by Sacramento, Calif.-based Aerojet and rebranded as AJ-26s — will be lit for about 30 seconds.

Antares would have its maiden flight a month after a successful hold-down test, Orbital said Oct. 1.

Assuming a successful test flight, a full-up Antares-Cygnus stack would be cleared to fly a demonstration cargo run to the space station before the end of the year, Orbital said.

In that mission, Cygnus would deliver 550 kilograms of freight and relieve the outpost of about 1,000 kilograms of trash, Orbital said.

Antares will launch all of its space station resupply missions from Pad 0-A at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS), a facility at the southern tip of Wallops Island that is operated by the state-funded Virginia Commercial Spaceflight Authority.

Because MARS and Pad 0-A are on a NASA range, the agency had to give its approval for Orbital to begin operations at the launch pad.