HOUSTON - NASA Television will provide live coverage of the arrival of a new shipment of food, fuel, supplies and holiday gifts to the International Space Station on the morning after Christmas.

Expedition 16 Commander Peggy Whitson and flight engineers Yuri Malenchenko and Dan Tani will be standing by as the unpiloted ISS Progress 27 resupply craft automatically docks to the station's Pirs Docking Compartment on Wednesday, Dec. 26, at about 2:25 a.m. CST. NASA TV coverage of the new spacecraft's arrival at the station will begin at 2 a.m.

The cargo ship is carrying more than 2 tons of supplies for the three crew members. It will be launched on Sunday, Dec. 23, at 1:12 a.m., from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. There will be no television coverage of the launch.