Jules Verne visits space station

A new European cargo ship flew up to the International Space Station and docked Thursday, delivering food, water and clothes in its orbital debut.

The unmanned cargo ship, called Jules Verne, was operated by flight controllers at a European Space Agency center in Toulouse, France.

NASA’s Mission Control in Houston and Russia’s control center outside Moscow kept close tabs on the operation, which culminated in the morning linkup more than 200 miles above the Atlantic. So did the three space station residents.

Twice over the last week, flight controllers in Toulouse guided Jules Verne to close encounters with the space station.

The practice gave them confidence that the spacecraft’s systems would perform as planned for the docking. Indeed, everything went smoothly with the automatic linkup after a 26-day flight.

“Around the world in 26 days, the European Space Agency’s Jules Verne . . . has pulled into port at the International Space Station,” announced Mission Control commentator Rob Navias in Houston.

Jules Verne -- one of the European Space Agency’s major contributions to the space station -- rocketed away from French Guiana on March 9 with several tons of oxygen, fuel, water and other supplies. It had to wait for shuttle Endeavour to leave the orbiting complex; Endeavour’s mission ended last week.

Jules Verne is named after the 19th century French science-fiction writer whose works included “Around the World in 80 Days” and “From the Earth to the Moon.”

Some of the author’s original notes were packed aboard the spacecraft to commemorate its maiden voyage.

The spacecraft won’t be opened until today, and the crew won’t be able to start unloading it until Saturday. That’s how long it will take to clean the air inside the docked vessel, Smith said.