Late Tuesday, commercial Cygnus cargo ship was launched into space. Streaking into the Florida night sky, it is on a delivery mission, carrying a record-setting load of NASA experiments and gear to the International Space Station (ISS).

Yesterday, at 11:05 pm the Orbital ATK-built Cygnus blasted off atop an Atlas V rocket EDT in a smooth liftoff from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Packed with over 3.5 tons of supplies, the cargo ship is likely to arrive at the space station early on March 26.

The flight is the second for Orbital ATK's improved Cygnus craft on an Atlas V rocket given by the United Launch Alliance. The company representatives said that the cargo ship has onboard even more cargo as compared to the Orbital ATK's last record-breaking flight in December.

While speaking to Space.com, Frank DeMauro, Orbital ATK's CRS program director, said, “On our last mission, on OA-4, we were the biggest payload that Atlas V ever launched — we broke the record. Well, we broke the record again; we're the biggest again”.

NASA officials said that the recently launched Cygnus spacecraft is packed with science gear, a haul, including roughly 7,500 lbs. of important crew supplies, hardware and study tools meant for the station.

The spacecraft also has some gear aboard that isn't meant to stay on the station, which includes a large-scale fire experiment and a cloud of five microsatellites that will be released once the craft will leave from the ISS in May.

The Cygnus spacecraft has been named the S.S. Rick Husband by Orbital ATK, honoring NASA astronaut Rick Husband and space shuttle commander, who lost life on February 1, 2003, at the time of STS-107 mission aboard Columbia. During launch, Columbia suffered wing damage and broke apart during re-entry, killing Husband and six crewmates.