The following is an excerpt from a story by Maria-Jose Vinas, NASA’s Earth Science News Team Defying 30 mph gusts and temperatures down to minus 22°F, NASA’s new polar rover, GROVER, recently demonstrated in Greenland that it could operate completely autonomously in one of Earth’s harshest environments. The solar-powered robot, developed by students, was able […]
New Status: USOS Extravehicular Activity (EVA) #22 Preparations: In preparation for tomorrow’s planned EVA, Flight Engineer (FE)-3 Cassidy and FE-5 Parmitano conducted a final tool configuration followed by an independent tool audit by FE-6 Nyberg. All three crew, plus FE-4 Yurchikhin, completed a final procedures review, and then the USOS crew members participated in a …
The following is an excerpt from a story by Alan Buis, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory… The curtain has come down on a superstar of satellite oceanography that played the “Great Blue Way” of the world’s ocean for 11.5 years. The joint NASA and Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales (CNES) Jason-1 ocean altimetry satellite was decommissioned on […]
New Status: Columbus (COL) Water Pump Assembly (WPA)-2 Remove & Replace (R&R) and Commissioning: On January 13, a Thermal Control System (TCS) WPA1 to WPA2 switchover activity was scheduled in support of Water On/Off Valve (WOOV) 1 & 2 periodic cycling. Troubleshooting was conducted but attempts to start WPA-2 were unsuccessful and COL has been …
New Status: Extravehicular Activity (EVA) Preparations: Crewmembers conducted a number of activities in preparation for next Tuesday’s USOS EVA #22. Flight Engineer (FE)-3 Cassidy, FE-5 Parmitano, and FE-6 Nyberg, with assistance from FE-4 Yurchikhin, performed the EVA On-orbit Fit check Verification to verify correct sizing of the EVA Mobility Units (EMUs). Parmitano also checked out …
New Status: Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV)-4 Transfer Operations: Flight Engineer (FE)-3 Cassidy, FE-5 Parmitano, and FE-6 Nyberg have completed 94% of transfer operations as of today. The crew performed approximately 9 hours of scheduled operations in six hours. Approximately 5 hours 20 minutes remain of ATV4 cargo operations, which will not be scheduled until after …
New Status: Extravehicular Activity (EVA) Prep: Flight Engineer (FE)-3 Cassidy and FE-5 Parmitano continued with preparations for next week’s EVA #22 scheduled for July 9. Cassidy relocated hardware from the Airlock not needed for the EVA and prepared the Airlock to support EVA operations. Both crewmembers completed the Simplified Aid for EVA Rescue (SAFER) On-board …
New Status: Robonaut Experiment: FE-5 Parmitano set up Robonaut for a second day of ground commanded activities. Today’s objectives included a vision recognition test and velocicalc measurements to characterize air flow in the work volume. Robonaut is a humanoid robot designed with the versatility and dexterity to manipulate hardware and react safely when bumped or …
Somehow, a recent conversation on Twitter about tweet density led to a mention of the installation of variable highway lighting in the Netherlands, by way of the 2012 NASA/NOAA city lights map. Which made me wonder—would we be able to see the effects of the new lighting from space? After all, the day night band […]
New Status: Ocular Health: The crew continued Ocular Health activities with Flight Engineer (FE)-5 Parmitano and FE-6 Nyberg performing ultrasound scans with each crewmember acting as a Crew Medical Officer (CMO) and subject. They also performed cardiac ultrasound scans and blood pressure measurements. These activities are a part of the nominal medical testing on ISS …
