Q&A with Mark Sirangelo, leader of Sierra Nevada Space Systems

Russia’s Progress MS-03 cargo crafted rode a Soyuz rocket into orbit Saturday from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, beginning a two-day pursuit of the International Space Station.

Russian mission control said Thursday an unpiloted Progress space station supply ship carrying nearly 5,400 pounds of rocket fuel, food, water and a new spacesuit burned up in Earth’s atmosphere shortly after it blasted off from Kazakhstan, and evidence points to a problem with the third stage of the cargo carrier’s Soyuz booster.

Japan’s sixth HTV supply ship departed the International Space Station on Friday and headed for a destructive re-entry over the South Pacific with trash and disused batteries from the research lab, but engineers will first use the spacecraft for a pioneering experiment to investigate a new way to remove space junk from orbit.