A private company will make a trial cargo run to the International Space Station in February, a key step in a new US program to buy spaceflight services on a commercial basis, NASA said Friday. California-based Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, plans to launch a Falcon 9 rocket carrying a Dragon cargo capsule from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on Feb. 7. The mission would mark the second flights of the Falcon 9 and Dragon, which debuted in December 2010. “SpaceX has made incredible progress over the last several months preparing Dragon for its mission to the space station,” NASA associate administrator William Gerstenmaier said in a statement. “We look forward to a successful mission, which will open up a new era in commercial cargo delivery for this international orbiting laboratory.”
