ATV-3, Europe's unmanned cargo carrier, has docked with the International Space Station, NASA said on Thursday.
The third Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV), named after Italian physicist Edoardo Amaldi, blasted off from the Kourou space center in French Guiana on March 23.
The U.S. space agency said the European spacecraft “docked automatically to the aft port of the Zvezda service module” at 22:31 GMT.
The biggest cargo carrier servicing the ISS brought to the station 6.59 metric tons of cargo, including fuel, water, food and other necessities, and is scheduled to spend 171 days in the orbit.
The first ATV, Jules Verne, was launched in 2008, delivering about 4.5 metric tons of food, fuel and equipment to the ISS. ATV-2, named after Johannes Kepler, was launched in February last year and remained docked with the ISS until late June.
