NASA TV Coverage Set for Saturday Orbital-2 Mission to Space Station
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NASA Television will provide live coverage of the upcoming Orbital Sciences'
mission to resupply the International Space Station. Orbital's Cygnus cargo
spacecraft is schedule to launch from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport's
Launch Pad 0A at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia on Saturday, July
12 at 1:14 p.m. EDT.

Weather conditions at Wallops Tuesday night delayed the scheduled rollout of
Orbital's Antares rocket to the launch pad Wednesday, prompting the company
to delay launch by a day.

NASA TV will air a comprehensive video feed of launch preparations and other
footage related to the mission beginning at noon. Launch coverage on NASA TV
will begin at 12:30 p.m. A post-launch news conference will be held at 2:45
p.m.

On Friday, July 11, media briefings previewing the mission's science cargo
and a prelaunch status from Wallops will be broadcast on NASA TV at 4 p.m.
and 5 p.m., respectively.

Media also may join the briefings by phone. To obtain dial-in information,
media must contact Rachel Kraft at rachel.h.kraft@nasa.gov [1] with their
name and media affiliation no later than 30 minutes before the beginning of
each briefing. The public also may ask questions on social media using the
hashtag #AskNASA.

The Cygnus will be filled with approximately 3,300 pounds of supplies for the
station, including science experiments to expand the research capability of
the space station's Expedition 40 crew members aboard the station, crew
provisions, spare parts and experiment hardware.

Among the research investigations headed to the orbital laboratory are a
flock of nanosatellites designed to take images of Earth, developed by Planet
Labs of San Francisco, and a satellite-based investigation called TechEdSat-4
built by NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, California, which aims
to develop technology that eventually will enable small samples to be
returned to Earth from the space station. In addition, a host of student
experiments are on board as part of the Student Spaceflight Experiment
Program, an initiative of the National Center for Earth and Space Science
Education and NanoRacks.

This and future commercial cargo resupply flights will ensure a robust
national capability to deliver critical science research to orbit,
significantly increasing NASA's ability to conduct new science investigations
to the only laboratory in microgravity.

If Cygnus launches as scheduled, the spacecraft will arrive at the space
station on Tuesday, July 15. Station commander Steven Swanson of NASA and
Flight Engineer Alexander Gerst of the European Space Agency will be standing
by in the station’s cupola to capture the resupply craft with the station's
robotic arm and install it on the Earth-facing port of the station's Harmony
module.

NASA TV coverage of capture and installation will begin at 6:15 a.m. on July
15. Grapple is scheduled at approximately 7:24 a.m. Coverage of the
installation of Cygnus onto Harmony will begin at 9:30 a.m.

For a full update of media activities and more information on the Orbital-2
mission,
visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/orbital

For NASA TV streaming video, downlink and scheduling information, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/nasatv

For video b-roll and media resources on the International Space Station,
visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/stationnews

For more information about International Space Station, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/station