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Space station supply launch called off

A delivery to the International Space Station has been postponed because of a boat in the waters near the Virginia launch pad.

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A space station delivery mission has been scrubbed just hours after the orbiting lab had to sidestep a piece of treacherous junk.

Orbital Sciences Corporation got to within the 10-minute mark for the Virginia launch of its unmanned Cygnus capsule.

But a sailing boat ended up in the restricted danger zone and controllers halted the evening countdown.

The Virginia-based company will try again on Tuesday evening.

Space station flight controllers steered the complex and its six inhabitants away from satellite wreckage earlier in the day.

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The debris - part of an old, destroyed Russian satellite - would have passed within two-tenths of a mile of the station if not for the manoeuvre.

Mission Control was informed of the space junk over the weekend.

Orbital Sciences Corp's unmanned Cygnus capsule - on the pad at Wallops Island, Virginia - holds 2200kg of cargo for NASA.

That includes 32 mini research satellites, a meteor tracker, and a tank of high-pressure nitrogen to replenish a vestibule used by spacewalking astronauts.

NASA is paying Orbital Sciences and SpaceX to make regular space station deliveries.


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