53 Soyuz (53S) Launch: 53S launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome this morning with Anton Shkaplerov, Scott Tingle, and Norishige Kanai. Docking to the Mini Research Module-1 (MRM-1) module is scheduled for 02:42 AM CST on December 19 with hatch opening at ~4:15 AM CST. SpaceX (SpX)-13 Capture and Berthing: SpX-13 rendezvous and capture were successfully …
51 Soyuz (51S) Undock and Landing: The 51S crew Randolph Bresnik, Sergey Ryazanskiy and Paolo Nespoli undocked from the ISS at 11:13 pm CST on Wednesday evening and landed at 2:37am CST on Thursday. Ryazanskiy has arrived back in Moscow and Bresnik and Nespoli have arrived back in Houston. The ISS will be in 3-crew …
51 Soyuz (51S) Undock and Landing Preparations: The crew completed packing the cargo for return on 51S. Randy Bresnik handed over command of the ISS to Alexander Misurkin. Following the Change of Command, the new Commander’s Soyuz crew became prime for emergencies. Bresnik, Sergey Ryazanskiy, and Paolo Nespoli will undock from the ISS at 11:13 …
NanoRacks Vuze (One Strange Rock) Camera Operations in the Service Module: The crew used the NanoRacks Vuze camera to record 3-Dementional 360-degree videos inside of the ISS. The handheld camera was used in the USOS and Russian Segment to capture long corridor footage to give the viewer a 3D perspective of floating through the ISS. …
Probiotics Operations: Over the weekend, a crewmember completed the fourth and final sampling phase of the JAXA Probiotic investigation. The first half of the sampling phase was completed on GMT 343 with fecal sample collections. The second half of the sampling phase included saliva sample collections and a questionnaire, which was completed the following day. …
Lighting Effects: A 52S crewmember logged into the sleep log application and provided a sleep log entry to track his daily sleep patterns and wakefulness. This entry supports a two week long sleep shift session that began earlier this week.The Lighting Effects investigation studies the impact of the change from fluorescent light bulbs to solid-state …
Electrostatic Levitation Furnace (ELF) Sample Operations: The crew retrieved and cleaned the ELF sample cartridge and then transferred three samples from one set of sample holders to another set of holders. ELF is an experimental facility designed to levitate, melt and solidify materials by container less processing techniques using the electrostatic levitation method. With this …
OA-8 Cygnus Release: After yesterday’s unberth and the overnight GPS shadowing (“Photobomb”) Detailed Test Objective (DTO), today SSRMS ground controllers relocated the Cygnus vehicle to the release point and the onboard crew released the vehicle and monitored its departure. Cygnus will be held in that position overnight and then repositioned for release tomorrow. Cygnus arrived …
Cygnus unberth: This morning, the crew egressed Cygnus. They then configured the vestibule and prepared to depressurize the vestibule. Ground teams identified EMI as the cause of the pressure probe anomaly and successfully depressurized the vestibule. Later, the Cygnus vehicle was unberthed and positioned it for the GPS shadowing (“photobomb”) Developmental Test Objective (DTO). Cygnus …
Earth Imagery from ISS Target Operations: Over the weekend, the crew captured images and video footage of Japan, the Sahara Desert, the India-Himalayas-Tibetan Plateau, Seattle and the Pacific Northwest, and Ireland to Moscow at night. Today the crew captured images of the Himalayas, facing northwest up the mountain range. The Earth Imagery from ISS investigation …
