Overview
- HTV‑X1 was captured by Canadarm2 at 12:58 a.m. JST and berthed to the International Space Station at 8:10 p.m. JST on October 30, with operations coordinated by JAXA and NASA.
- JAXA astronaut Kimiya Yui operated the robotic arm for the rendezvous and capture, enabling a smooth handoff to begin internal and external cargo transfers.
- Launched October 26 on Japan’s H3 rocket from Tanegashima, the new craft brings redesigned solar arrays, upgraded avionics and roughly 25% more pressurized cargo capacity than HTV, a flight NASA called “flawless.”
- The shipment includes fresh food, water and experiment hardware such as the Demonstration System for CO₂ Removal and materials for the Kibo module.
- After unberthing, HTV‑X1 is slated to conduct in‑orbit tech demos including smallsat deployment (H‑SSOD), a laser attitude experiment (Mt. FUJI), a deployable antenna (DELIGHT) and next‑generation solar cells (SDX), alongside more than 20 ISS National Lab research projects reported for this mission.