Video: Time lapse of ATV’s final departure from ISS

A future where mission control can digitally dispatch tools, spare parts and other vital materials to far-flung space crews took one giant leap toward reality when a 3D printer aboard the International Space Station produced a ratchet wrench on demand.

Heading for a destructive re-entry over the South Pacific with several tons of trash, Japan’s fifth HTV cargo craft departed the International Space Station on Monday after overcoming a last-minute snag in the lab’s robotics system.

Extra testing of the James Webb Space Telescope and delays in assembling the powerful observatory will push back the $10 billion mission’s launch by at least six months to early 2019, officials announced last week as the telescope successfully completed an extensive performance test inside a cryogenic vacuum chamber in Houston.