Japanese cargo craft departs space station

Japan’s sixth HTV supply ship departed the International Space Station on Friday and headed for a destructive re-entry over the South Pacific with trash and disused batteries from the research lab, but engineers will first use the spacecraft for a pioneering experiment to investigate a new way to remove space junk from orbit. The cargo freighter was detached from the space station’s Harmony module shortly after 6 a.m. EST (1100 GMT) Friday, then released from the lab’s Canadian-built robotic arm at 10:46 a.m. EST (1546 GMT) under the command of flight engineer Thomas Pesquet. More

(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Jan 28)