Disposal for Cargo Launches

[CommercialSpaceFan]

What do SpaceX and Orbital do for disposal on their respective cargo launches?  Do they deorbit both their upper stages and Dragon/Cygnus?  Do they target ocean or assume that everything burns up during atmospheric entry?

[NovaSilisko]

I know at least that SpaceX in recent times has, when there's been enough fuel, deorbited the second stage over the indian ocean, west of Australia.

[Jim]

What do SpaceX and Orbital do for disposal on their respective cargo launches?  Do they deorbit both their upper stages and Dragon/Cygnus?  Do they target ocean or assume that everything burns up during atmospheric entry?

Antares upperstage is solid so it can't do a deorbit burn.  Cygnus is purposely deorbited to provide trash disposal for the ISS.  Spacex hopes the Dragon does burn up.  Falcon 9 upper stage depends on the mission

[rayleighscatter]

It looks like the Castor second stage from Antares seems to spend about 7-10 days in orbit before reentry.

[llanitedave]

What do SpaceX and Orbital do for disposal on their respective cargo launches?  Do they deorbit both their upper stages and Dragon/Cygnus?  Do they target ocean or assume that everything burns up during atmospheric entry?

Antares upperstage is solid so it can't do a deorbit burn.  Cygnus is purposely deorbited to provide trash disposal for the ISS.  Spacex hopes the Dragon does burn up.  Falcon 9 upper stage depends on the mission

Freudian slip there?  It's not SpaceX that hopes the Dragon does burn up.

[Jim]

Freudian slip there?  It's not SpaceX that hopes the Dragon does burn up.

Contrary to popular belief, I am not anti Spacex.  I am anti koolade drinker.

[pericynthion]

Do they target ocean or assume that everything burns up during atmospheric entry?

Upper stages for low altitude LEO missions such as the ISS cargo resupply flights don't pose much of a debris risk, because they remain below the orbits of operational satellites and they reenter quickly.
In terms of risk to people and property on the ground, the manufacturers do not merely assume that everything burns up, but do the analysis to prove that that is the case (or to quantify the risk, if it's not the case).  For low density objects such as an empty upper stage, they tend to burn up pretty easily.