#atv5

Expedition 42 Flight Engineer's Terry Virts and Samantha Christoforetti captured these astounding views of the last-ever Automated Transfer Vehicle reentering the atmosphere an hour ago.  Virts tweeted the photo with the phrase "It was surprising to see how high the smoke trail was." Christoforetti was nearby capturing images of her own, and she tweeted out the first picture accompanied by "Good bye #ATV5! Arrivederci ATV5!" ATV-5 undocked from the space station yesterday, as can be seen in this Vine from Virts. Reentry was scheduled for later this month, but a faulty power chain caused the event to be bumped up to earlier this afternoon.

ATV-5 ended its mission in a fiery reentry over the Pacific Ocean minutes ago. Not only did it bring to end a successful mission, but also concluded one of Europe's flagship space operations of their history.  The Automated Transfer Vehicle was important not just to ESA, but to Europe as a whole for supporting human operations in space. An ATV vehicle will never fly in space again, so naturally the immense team of engineers, technicians and controllers on the ground are emotional.  As these images from ATV Control in Toulouse, France show, controllers are crying, hugging, and applauding the conclusion of a two decade-long program.

Ground controllers in Toulouse, France have reported that telemetry from the Georges Lemaître has become intermittent. This is characteristic of the vehicle beginning to tumble.

The fifth Automated Transfer Vehicle, Georges Lemaître, is seen departing the International Space Station yesterday, 14 February, 2015. Built by the European Space Agency, ATV-5 is the last in the agency's series of cargo supply ships that were first launched in 2008. As part of ESA's contractual agreement in the space station's charter, the agency flew five ATV resupply vessels to supplement America, Russian and Japanese resupply crafts. The ATV was the largest cargo craft to visit the station, and Georges Lemaître marked the heaviest payload an Ariane V rocket had ever lofted into orbit. Originally, ATV-5 was expected to reenter the Earth's atmosphere towards the end of February in order to analyze how destructive forces affected the vehicle. However, this 'shallow dive' into the atmosphere was cancelled when one of four power chains on the vehicle malfunctioned.  Ground Controllers in Toulouse, France have decided to plunge the spacecraft towards reentry later today. However, unlike previous cargo flights, ATV 5 will carry the REBR camera - or ReEntry Breakup Recorder. This will film the gradual destruction of the spacecraft in infrared too help engineers better understand the stresses vehicles undergo during destructive reentry. While the ATV program is drawing to a close, lessons and hardware developed will continue to benefit humanity. NASA's Orion spacecraft will utilize ATV hardware and design experience on its Service Module. Visually, ATV's signature X-shaped solar arrays will carry over to Orion. UPDATE: the final command from ATV-Control Center in Tolouse, France was sent at 12:52 PM EST. Reentry is expected within 20 minutes.

The European Space Agency's contract with the ISS partners included five resupply flights with the ATV. While no more vehicles will be flown to the laboratory, its legacy will live on. In early 2013, NASA announced that the Service module for the Orion spacecraft will use hardware from the ATV program. The service module will be manufactured by the European Space Agency. ESA Operations released a brief news release on today's event, which can be viewed here.

ESA’s ATV5 docking with the ISS