TECH

Cygnus named after Columbia commander Rick Husband

Dave Berman
FLORIDA TODAY

The next launch to the International Space Station will honor space shuttle astronaut Rick Husband — who died with his six crewmates in the Columbia accident in 2003.

Orbital ATK announced this week that its Cygnus spacecraft will be named the S.S. Rick Husband.

Cygnus will be on a resupply mission to the International Space Station. The launch is scheduled at 11:05 p.m. March 22 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.

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Dan Tani, senior director of mission and cargo operations for Orbital ATK, announced the naming of the spacecraft after Husband, noting that it was an appropriate tribute.

"His faith was extremely important to him, and he was really a wonderful man," Tani, a former space shuttle astronaut, said during a mission briefing at Kennedy Space Center.

In addition to being commander of the Columbia STS-107 mission, in which the spacecraft disintegrated during re-entry, Husband was the pilot on the Discovery STS-96 mission in 1999, during which the crew performed the first docking with the ISS.

The commander on that Discovery crew was Kent Rominger, who now is vice president of strategy and business development at Orbital ATK.

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Orbital ATK has named each of its Cygnus spacecrafts after an astronaut, but this is the first one named after an astronaut who participated in the building of the International Space Station.

In a statement issued by Orbital ATK, the company said it is "proud to add Rick's name to our legacy of cargo delivery to this outpost in space, and to honor the memory of this brave and dedicated crew" who died aboard Columbia.

Husband's hometown of Amarillo, Texas, honored him by renaming the city's airport as Rick Husband Amarillo International Airport.

Contact Berman at 321-242-3649 or dberman@floridatoday.com. Follow him on Twitter @ByDaveBerman and on Facebook at facebook.com/dave.berman.54

Launch information

The fifth commercial resupply mission for Orbital ATK is targeted for liftoff on a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket at 11:05 p.m. March 22 from Space Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. The Cygnus spacecraft for this mission is named the S.S. Rick Husband.