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The International Space Station (ISS) orbital altitude will be raised by 1.7 kilometers (about a mile) on Wednesday, a spokesman for the Russian Mission Control orbital altitude has said. The space station manoeuvre will be carried out with the help of eight boosters on board the Progress M-04M space freighter which is currently docked with the Zvezda module on the ISS, Ria Novosti quoting the spokesman said. "As a result of the operation...the ISS's orbit will be raised 1.7 kilometers, bringing the space station to an altitude of 348 kilometers (about 216 miles) above the Earth's surface," he said. The...

KOUROU, French Guiana (AFP) — The European Space Agency on Sunday carried out the maiden launch of a massive robot freighter designed to rendezvous automatically with the orbital space station. The Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV), a nearly 20-tonne payload the size of a London double-decker bus, blasted into the skies aboard a beefed-up Ariane 5 launcher, an AFP reporter saw. After being placed in orbit, the cylinder-shaped craft will deploy its solar panels and gently find its way to the International Space Station (ISS) and berth with it. The launch had initially been scheduled for Saturday but was postponed for...