The International Space Station said goodbye to two cargo craft in late October. Dragon CRS-4, operated as a recoverable “up and down” cargo freighter for NASA by SpaceX, was unberthed from the station by the ISS robot arm at 1202 GMT on 25 October and fully released at 1357 GMT on the same day. Having moved away from the station, Dragon CRS-4 then made a deorbit burn at 1843 GMT splashing down in the Pacific off Baja, California where ships were waiting to recover it.
Less recoverable is the Russian freighter Progress M-024M which undocked from the ISS Pirs module at 0538 GMT on 27 October 2014.
The craft was full of the “trash” that the astronauts and cosmonauts do not want anymore, consequently, the Progress is due to be destroyed during its planned fiery re-entry on 20 November 2014. In between, the spacecraft is being involved in an optical communications test.
