The Russian Progress 96 robotic cargo spacecraft rendezvoused with the space station today (September 19). Progress 96 launched atop a Soyuz rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on Wednesday (September 16), kicking off a three-day orbital chase of the International Space Station (ISS). That chase came to an end today at 9:44 a.m. EDT (1344 GMT), when the freighter docked with the ISS Poisk Module spaceport. The two spacecraft were flying 418 kilometers (260 miles) over the Black Sea at the time, according to NASA’s docking webcast. Russia’s Progress 96 cargo spacecraft arrives at the International Space Station on September 19, 2026. (Image credit: NASA) Progress 96 carried about 3 tons of food, fuel and other supplies for the occupants of the ISS. There are currently seven such people: Jack Hathaway, Jessica Meir and Anil Menon of NASA, Sophie Adenot of the European Space Agency, and Pyotr Dubrov, Andrey Fedyaev and Anna. Kikina from the Russian space agency Roscosmos. You might like that Progress 96 remains attached to the ISS for about five months. It will then be loaded with trash and sent to burn in Earth’s atmosphere. This is the final destination of most of the ISS resupply spacecraft: every Progress vehicle, HTV-X (built by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency), and Cygnus (provided by Northrop Grumman). The only reusable freighter in the current fleet is SpaceX’s Dragon capsule. Editor’s note: This story was updated at 9:55 a.m. ET on Sept. 19 with news of a successful docking.
