It was the first return load from the station in a year, following a SpaceX launch accident in June 2015 that destroyed another Dragon capsule. The company's Dragon capsules are currently the only ships that can return cargo from the station, a 100 billion research laboratory that flies about 250 miles (400 km) above Earth. SpaceX resumed Dragon flights to the station last month. On Wednesday, ground controllers at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston used the station's robot arm to pluck the unmanned capsule from its berthing port at 7:02 a.m. and position it for release into space. British astronaut Timothy Peake, working from inside the space station's cupola module, then commanded the crane to free its grip at 9:19 a.m. as the station sailed over Australia so Dragon could begin its ride back to Earth.