Blogs

The photo shows the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment Follow-On (GRACE-FO) being stacked for its rideshare to space with Iridium Communications satellites in a SpaceX processing facility at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. Launch is scheduled for Tuesday, May 22, at 12:47 p.m. PDT. As of Saturday, meteorologists with the U.S. Air Force’s 30th …

Orbital-ATK 9 (OA-9) Launch: OA-9 launch from the Wallops Flight Facility is set for Monday 21-May at 08:39 GMT (3:39 CT).  OA-9 capture and berthing to the ISS continues to be planned Thursday 24-May. Exposed Experiment Handrail Attachment Mechanism (ExHAM) #2:  Today the crew attached new samples to the ExHAM#2, which is attached to the …

The Orbital ATK Cygnus cargo craft that will resupply the Expedition 55 crew on the International Space Station rolled out to its launch pad Thursday night. Cygnus is now targeted to blast off atop the Antares rocket Monday at 4:39 a.m. EDT from Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. NASA TV will begin its live broadcast of the launch Monday at 4 […]

Crew: Captain Scott ”Maker” Tingle, USN ISS Location: Low Earth Orbit Earth Date: 4 March 2018 Earth Time (GMT): 13:30 I did an interview with some students today, and I was asked a two-part question by one of the students. He asked, “What is the most exciting thing about being in space, and how did …

Exposed Experiment Handrail Attachment Mechanism (ExHAM) #2:  The crew opened the Japanese Experiment Module Airlock (JEMAL) inner hatch and extended the Airlock slide table into the JEM. They detached and stowed samples for return to the ground from the Handhold Experiment Platform (HXP).  The ExHAM is a cuboid mechanism equipped with a fixture on the …

Crew: Captain Scott ”Maker” Tingle, USN ISS Location: Low Earth Orbit Earth Date: 27 Jan 2018 Earth Time (GMT): 14:45 The smoke detectors have been setting off alarms. This happens routinely due to dust circulating in the modules, but every alarm is taken seriously. This is the third time that the alarm has sounded while …

NASA’s latest Earth-observing satellite mission, Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment Follow-On (GRACE-FO) is now scheduled to launch no earlier than Tuesday, May 22 at at 3:47 p.m. EDT. The GRACE-FO prelaunch briefing will be held on Monday, May 21 at 1:30 p.m. EDT (10:30 a.m. PDT) from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. The briefing …

Crew: Captain Scott ”Maker” Tingle, USN ISS Location: Low Earth Orbit Earth Date: 23 January 2018 Earth Time (GMT): 22:00 We just finished a 20-hour work day. I spent nearly 11 hours in the spacesuit, and 7 hours and 24 minutes doing a spacewalk. The view was amazing. The changes from day to night, and …

US EVA 50 Pump and Flow Control Subassembly (PFCS) Relocate: Today Drew Feustel (EV-1) and Ricky Arnold (EV-2) executed US EVA #50. The following tasks were accomplished during the EVA: A swap of the Pump/Flow Control Subassemblies (PFCS) between the Enhanced ORU Transfer Platform (EOTP) and External Stowage Platform (ESP)-1 locations Removal and Replacement (R&R) …

Expedition 55 Flight Engineers Drew Feustel and Ricky Arnold of NASA completed the fifth spacewalk of this year at 2:10 p.m. EDT, lasting 6 hours, 31 minutes. The two astronauts moved the Pump Flow Control Subassembly (PFCS) from a spare parts platform on the station’s truss to the Dextre robotic arm. The PFCS drives and …