Crew Works Science, Maintenance Before Dragon Launches Tonight

Astronauts (from left) Loral O'Hara and Jasmin Moghbeli pose for a portrait while working inside the Quest airlock.
Astronauts (from left) Loral O’Hara and Jasmin Moghbeli pose for a portrait while working inside the Quest airlock.

A U.S. cargo craft is at its launch pad in Florida counting down to a liftoff tonight to the International Space Station. Meanwhile, the Expedition 70 crew spent the day working on robotics research, cell biology, and a fitness evaluation.

The SpaceX Dragon cargo spacecraft is due to blast off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center at 8:28 p.m. EDT today. It will carry several tons of science, supplies, and hardware to the orbital outpost and automatically dock to the Harmony module’s forward port at 5:21 a.m. on Saturday. NASA TV, on the agency’s app and website, will broadcast both the launch and docking of SpaceX’s 29th commercial resupply mission.

NASA astronauts Loral O’Hara and Jasmin Moghbeli will be on duty Saturday morning overseeing Dragon’s automated approach and rendezvous maneuvers. The NASA duo spent Thursday afternoon with Commander Andreas Mogensen and Flight Engineer Satoshi Furukawa reviewing the new cargo manifest and the unloading operations they will perform after Dragon arrives and the hatches open.

Mogensen from ESA (European Space Agency) began his day in the Kibo laboratory module and worked there until the afternoon testing the operations of the Astrobee robotic helper. The robotics work was demonstrating how the toaster-sized free-flyer can use a small robotic arm and grasp handrails to maneuver throughout the space station.

Furukawa from JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) also worked inside Kibo setting up research hardware to study how cells sense gravity. Afterward, he assisted O’Hara and Moghbeli as they worked throughout Thursday cleaning and installing components inside the Tranquility module’s bathroom, formally known as the Waste and Hygiene Compartment.

Roscosmos Flight Engineer Konstantin Borisov attached sensors to himself and jogged on the Zvezda service module’s treadmill for a fitness evaluation during the morning. Afterward, he spent the rest of the day cleaning smoke detectors inside the Nauka science module.

Veteran cosmonaut Oleg Kononenko spent the morning on maintenance tasks inside Zvezda then prepared an experiment that records the vibrations the station experiences when a spacecraft docks or undocks. Flight Engineer Nikolai Chub worked on life support and electronics maintenance and packed the Progress 84 resupply ship with trash and discarded gear.

Learn more about station activities by following the space station blog, @space_station and @ISS_Research on X, as well as the ISS Facebook and ISS Instagram accounts.

Get weekly video highlights at: https://roundupreads.jsc.nasa.gov/videoupdate/

Get the latest from NASA delivered every week. Subscribe here: www.nasa.gov/subscribe



from Space Station https://ift.tt/5NUlDtb

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Station Wraps Busy Week Before Cygnus Cargo Mission Launches

Image
This high exposure photograph from the International Space Station shows Earth’s atmospheric glow and a starry sky as the orbital complex soared above the Pacific Ocean. The Expedition 70 crew is looking ahead to the arrival of a U.S. cargo craft due to arrive at the International Space Station next week. Meanwhile, the Axiom Space 3 (Ax-3) crew finished its first week in orbit with a busy schedule of research, education, and media activities. Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus cargo craft will take its first ride atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket when it lifts off at 12:29 p.m. EST on Monday from Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The private space freighter will be carrying over 8,200 pounds of science experiments, crew supplies, and lab hardware to the orbiting outpost. NASA Flight Engineer Jasmin Moghbeli is due to capture Cygnus with the Canadarm 2 robotic arm at 3:35 a.m. on Wednesday. She will be on duty that morning along with fellow NASA astronaut Loral O’Hara who will monitor Cygn...
Read more

Dream Chaser Undergoes Testing at NASA Test Facility in Ohio

Image
NASA and Sierra Space are making progress on the first flight of the company’s Dream Chaser spacecraft to the International Space Station. The uncrewed cargo spaceplane is planned to launch its demonstration mission in 2024 to the orbital complex as part of NASA’s commercial resupply services. Credit: Sierra Space/Shay Saldana NASA and Sierra Space are preparing for the first flight of the company’s Dream Chaser spacecraft to the International Space Station. Dream Chaser and its companion cargo module, called Shooting Star, arrived at NASA’s Neil Armstrong Test Facility in Sandusky, Ohio, for environmental testing, scheduled to start in mid-December, ahead of its first flight, scheduled for the first half of 2024. The Neil Armstrong Test Facility, part of NASA’s Glenn Research Center in Cleveland, is home to multiple test facilities, including the Space Environments Complex and the In-Space Propulsion Facility, both stops for Dream Chaser. The complex is home to the Mechanical Vib...
Read more

Crew Dragon Suit Checks as Station Begins Orbital Reboosts

Image
This long-exposure photograph from the space station reveals the Milky Way glittering above a bright but exaggerated atmospheric glow blanketing the Earth’s horizon. The Expedition 63 crew checked out SpaceX Crew Dragon suits today and stayed busy with a full slate of space research. The International Space Station also completed the first of three orbital reboosts to get ready for the next crew mission in October. Flight Engineers Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken inspected the suits they will wear when they return to Earth aboard the Crew Dragon spaceship. The duo tried on their suits for a fit check and ensured the components are in good condition. They are scheduled to depart the station on Saturday and splashdown the following day. NASA TV will cover all the departure activities live. The homebound-duo started the day replacing environmental control system (ECS) hardware aboard the orbiting lab. That work required temporarily removing a plant habitat from the Unity module to...
Read more