Skip to content
See the World Through ScienceA project of ALLATRA
News

Three Tons of Food and Fuel Reach the Space Station Crew

Space

Republish this story

Our work is licensed under Creative Commons BY-NC 4.0. You may republish this piece for free — with credit to ALLATRA Media and a link to the original, unedited beyond length trims, and not for commercial use.

Read the full license

A Russian Progress cargo freighter in orbit above a cloud-covered Earth, its two solar arrays extended and its docking end facing the camera.
The Progress 62P freighter maneuvers near the International Space Station during an undocking and redocking test (illustrative; Progress 96 is a later freighter of the same design)."Progress 62P Undocking and Redocking Test" by NASA Johnson, via nasa, BY-NC · CC-BY-NC-2.0

The Roscosmos Progress 96 cargo spacecraft docked to the space-facing port of the International Space Station's Poisk module at 9:44 a.m. EDT on Saturday, Sept. 19, NASA's space station blog reported. The freighter carries no crew, and the docking was automated: the spacecraft closed the last stretch under its own guidance, without anyone flying it.

Progress is the uncrewed delivery vehicle Roscosmos flies to the station, and this flight is a restock. NASA says the spacecraft is carrying about three tons of food, fuel and supplies for the Expedition 75 crew, the team currently living aboard.

The docking ends a trip that began on Sept. 16, when a Soyuz rocket lifted Progress 96 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. That liftoff was covered here when it happened; Saturday's docking is the next step of the same mission rather than a second flight.

The spacecraft will remain at the station about five months. It will then leave for a planned destructive reentry, a controlled burn-up in the atmosphere that disposes of the station's trash.

A six-panel collage of uncrewed cargo spacecraft that resupply the International Space Station: a Russian Progress, Japan's HTV, a SpaceX Dragon, Europe's ATV and two Cygnus freighters.
The uncrewed freighters that have supplied the International Space Station. The Roscosmos Progress, at top left, is the type that docked on September 19, 2026. — "Progress-HTV-Dragon-ATV Cyngus Cygnus-extended Collage" by Piponwa, via wikimedia, CC-BY-SA-4.0

Sources

By Kristopher R. JeffayWriter

Spot an error?

Spot an error?

Report an error

Spotted a mistake on this page? Tell us what's wrong and our editors will take a look.

What kind of problem?

Only if you'd like us to be able to follow up. We won't use it for anything else.

We correct mistakes openly. Select any text to flag it. Fixes are logged under our Corrections Policy.

Report an error

Reporting on

Three Tons of Food and Fuel Reach the Space Station Crew

What kind of problem?

Only if you'd like us to be able to follow up. We won't use it for anything else.

We read every report. Corrections are logged publicly.