14 DAY TRIAL // Just hours ago, a cargo craft carrying around 4.5 tons of supplies reached the International Space Station. Once captured by a robotic arm, it was guided towards the Earth-facing port of the orbiting laboratory's Harmony module, where it was bolted into place.
The Kounotori (“White Stork”) cargo craft launched from the Tanegashima Space Center in southern Japan last Wednesday, August 19, at 7:50 a.m. EDT. Its rendezvous with the International Space Station early today happened at 10:02 EDT on the dot, NASA informs.
The reason the Japanese cargo craft didn't simply head straight for the space laboratory once launched into Earth's orbit was because it first had to perform a series of engine burns meant to fine-tune its course and position it in the right place for a swift capture.
The H-II Transport Vehicle (HTV)-5 is scheduled to remain attached to the International Space Station for about five weeks. Once emptied of its supplies, the crew aboard the orbiting laboratory will fill it with trash and then send it to burn high up in our planet's atmosphere.
There's whiskey in the cargo craft
As mentioned, the craft launched from the Tangegashima Space Center in Japan carrying around 4.5 tons of supplies, chiefly food, water, equipment and experiment hardware.
Interestingly, word has it its cargo also includes a few bottles of whiskey and other spirits, sent to the International Space Station by Japanese company Suntory Global Innovation Center.
The beverages were sent to the space laboratory to research how conditions in orbit might influence their chemical profile and especially their alcohol content. Yet another batch remained on Earth and will serve as a control.
“With the exception of some items like beer, alcoholic beverages are widely known to develop a mellow flavor when aged for a long time. The Suntory Group aims to use these experiments to help find a scientific explanation for the 'mechanism that makes alcohol mellow.'”
Of the bottles of whiskey and other spirits delivered to the International Space Station this Wednesday, some will be returned to Earth in September 2016. Others will remain in orbit for a couple of years, maybe even more.
