A capsule on a first privately-run resupply mission successfully linked up Wednesday with the International Space Station, the US space agency NASA said. A robot arm operated by two of the six astronauts aboard the space station snatched the unmanned Dragon capsule at 1056 GMT, more than thirty minutes ahead of schedule, it said.
The docking was completed at 1303 GMT after the ISS crew inspected the capsule's condition with the help of cameras, NASA said. SpaceX, the private company owned by billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk, launched the Dragon Sunday evening atop a Falcon 9 rocket from an air base in Cape Canaveral, Florida near the Kennedy Space Center. The mission was the first of a dozen ISS supply runs that NASA has contracted out to SpaceX under a four-year, $1.6 billion contract, fulfilling a role once carried out by NASA's now retired shuttle fleet.