30 March 2006 02:30 GMT. Landing Date: 2006-04-08 23:48:00. Flight Time: 9.89 days. Flight Up: Soyuz TMA-8. Flight Back: Soyuz TMA-7. Crew: Pontes. Program: ISS. Of note: First Brazilian astronaut. Pontes flew to the ISS under an agreement between the government of Brazil and Roskosmos, the Russian Space Agency. Pontes' scientific research program aboard the ISS was dubbed the BSM Centenario project and consisted of the experiments Gosum, Dnarm, Smek, Nip, Cemex, Wmhp, Seeds, and Chrophyl.
ISS EP-10 Chronology - 2005 Oct 1 - Soyuz TMA-7 Crew: Tokarev, McArthur, Olsen. Spacecraft: Soyuz TMA. Payload: Soyuz TMA s/n 217. Mass: 7,250 kg (15,980 lb). Launch Site: Baikonur. Launch Vehicle: Soyuz. Duration: 189.83 days. Perigee: 347 km (215 mi). Apogee: 348 km (216 mi). Inclination: 51.60 deg. Period: 91.50 min.
Launch delayed from September 27. Soyuz TMA-7 docked with the International Space Station at 05:27 GMT on 3 October, bringing the long duration EO-12 crew of (McArthur, Commander; Tokarev, Flight Engineer) and space tourist Olsen. McArthur, Tokarev and Pontes (brought to the station aboard Soyuz TMA-8) transferred to TMA-7 on April 8, 2006, closing the hatches at 17:15 GMT and undocking from Zvezda at 20:28 GMT, leaving Vinogradov and Williams from Soyuz TMA-8 as the Expedition 13 in charge of the station. Soyuz TMA-7 fired its engines at 22:58 GMT for the deorbit burn and landed in Kazakhstan at 23:48 GMT.
- 2006 Mar 3 - International Space Station Status Report: SS06-008
Entering the homestretch of a half-year mission, International Space Station Commander Bill McArthur and Flight Engineer Valery Tokarev monitored the departure of one of two Russian cargo ships today. Filled with trash and items no longer needed, the Progress 19 vehicle undocked from the Zvezda living quarters module at 5:06 a.m. EST. Three hours later, Russian flight controllers commanded its engines to fire to put it on course to plunge into the atmosphere and burn up over the Pacific Ocean. The cargo ship was docked to the station since September 2005. The station's Progress 20 cargo vessel, which arrived in December 2005, remains attached to the Pirs Docking Compartment. Also this week, McArthur replaced the trace contaminant control system in the Destiny Laboratory. The system removes impurities from the cabin air. It experienced a slightly degraded performance over the past few months, but is operating normally. On Monday, McArthur will attempt to reconnect and activate the major constituent analyzer in Destiny. It is a mass spectrometer that measures compounds in the station's atmosphere. Efforts to activate the system two weeks ago were unsuccessful due to what is believed to be damaged or bent electrical connectors. Once the device is activated, plans can resume for a crew "campout" in the Quest Airlock to test streamlined spacewalk preparation procedures. The new procedures will shorten the time needed to cleanse nitrogen from spacewalkers' bodies to prevent decompression sickness. For the test, the crew will spend the night in Quest at a reduced pressure, lessening the time needed to breathe pure oxygen in advance of a spacewalk. The "campout" technique will be used for the first time for spacewalks on the STS-115 shuttle mission later this year. If the major constituent analyzer is successfully activated, the campout test will be scheduled around March 23. McArthur continued preparations for the arrival of the next shuttle mission. Discovery is targeted for launch no earlier than May on that flight, designated STS-121. This week, McArthur put unneeded items in racks earmarked for return to Earth aboard Discovery. McArthur and Tokarev will soon begin preparations for a short trip from the station. Managers have agreed on a tentative schedule on March 20 for the crew to relocate their Soyuz TMA-7 spacecraft from the Earth-facing docking port of the Zarya module to the aft docking port of Zvezda. McArthur and Tokarev will undock from Zarya and conduct a 37-minute flight to re-dock at Zvezda. The move will clear the Zarya port for the April 1 arrival of the Soyuz carrying the next station crew, Expedition 13. Expedition 13 is commanded by Pavel Vinogradov. Jeff Williams is NASA Flight Engineer. Brazilian astronaut Marcos Pontes will fly with them to the station for a short stay, returning to Earth a week later with McArthur and Tokarev. Next week, McArthur will brush up on his robotics skills, operating the Canadarm2 for engineering tests. The arm also will be remotely commanded by flight controllers in Houston. They will operate the arm to survey one of two integrated umbilical assembly mechanisms on the mobile transporter rail car. The assembly's cutting blade system malfunctioned Dec. 16, severing one of two umbilicals on the transporter. The assembly will be replaced on the second of the three spacewalks planned for Discovery's mission. Controllers also will use the arm to survey a vent port for the carbon dioxide removal assembly on the Destiny Laboratory.
- 2006 Mar 10 - International Space Station Status Report: SS06-010
Expedition 12 Commander Bill McArthur and Flight Engineer Valery Tokarev plan to move their Soyuz capsule from the Earth-facing docking port of the station's Zarya module to an aft port on the Zvezda module on Monday, March 20. If all goes as planned, the flight will take less than 40 minutes. Undocking is scheduled for 1:49 a.m. EST; with docking scheduled for 2:23 a.m. EST. This move will clear the Zarya port for the March 31 arrival of the Expedition 13 crew and a Brazilian Space Agency astronaut on another Soyuz vehicle. Preparations included testing Soyuz systems and thrusters and reviewing trip procedures. On Sunday, the crew will configure station and Soyuz systems. The configuration is to ensure the station could operate without the crew onboard; in the unlikely event the Soyuz could not successfully re-dock. This week, Expedition 13 Commander Pavel Vinogradov and Flight Engineer Jeff Williams completed final training at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City, Russia. The crew will travel Saturday to the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan for final launch preparations, along with Brazilian astronaut Marcos Pontes. Pontes will fly to the station with Expedition 13 on a 10-day mission, returning to Earth with Expedition 12. Launch is scheduled for March 29 at 9:30 p.m. EST. NASA's payload operations team at the agency's Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala., worked with McArthur to test an experiment facility on the station. The thermal and pressure sensors inside the microgravity science glovebox are checked annually to keep it certified for experiments. McArthur completed inspection and cleaning of the facility. McArthur also dedicated some of his free time last weekend to research work. On Saturday morning, he conducted an experiment that aims to improve future experiments that involve mixing fluids. The cellular biotechnology operations support systems fluid dynamics investigation is a series of experiments to improve fluid mixing techniques and control bubble distribution for cell culture in orbit.
- 2006 Mar 17 - International Space Station Status Report: SS06-011
Expedition 12 Commander Bill McArthur and Flight Engineer Valery Tokarev plan to move their Soyuz capsule from the Earth-facing docking port of the station's Zarya module to an aft port on the Zvezda module on Monday, March 20. If all goes as planned, the flight will take less than 40 minutes. Undocking is scheduled for 12:49 a.m. CST with docking scheduled for 1:23 a.m. CST. This move will clear the Zarya port for the March 31 arrival of the Expedition 13 crew and a Brazilian Space Agency astronaut on another Soyuz vehicle. Preparations included testing Soyuz systems and thrusters and reviewing trip procedures. On Sunday, the crew will configure station and Soyuz systems. The configuration is to ensure the station could operate without the crew onboard; in the unlikely event the Soyuz could not successfully re-dock. This week, Expedition 13 Commander Pavel Vinogradov and Flight Engineer Jeff Williams completed final training at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City, Russia. The crew will travel Saturday to the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan for final launch preparations, along with Brazilian astronaut Marcos Pontes. Pontes will fly to the station with Expedition 13 on a 10-day mission, returning to Earth with Expedition 12. Launch is scheduled for March 29 at 8:30 p.m. CST. NASA's payload operations team at the agency's Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala., worked with McArthur to test an experiment facility on the station. The thermal and pressure sensors inside the microgravity science glovebox are checked annually to keep it certified for experiments. McArthur completed inspection and cleaning of the facility. McArthur also dedicated some of his free time last weekend to research work. On Saturday morning, he conducted an experiment that aims to improve future experiments that involve mixing fluids. The cellular biotechnology operations support systems fluid dynamics investigation is a series of experiments to improve fluid mixing techniques and control bubble distribution for cell culture in orbit.
- 2006 Mar 24 - International Space Station Status Report: SS06-012
The Expedition 12 crew members have the International Space Station poised and ready for their replacements to arrive March 31. Soyuz Commander Valery Tokarev and Expedition 12 Commander Bill McArthur moved their Soyuz spacecraft from the Zarya module to the Zvezda living quarters module early Monday. They will use the same vehicle to return to Earth April 8. This week's move opened the Zarya docking port for the arrival of the Expedition 13 crew. The Expedition 13 crew, Commander Pavel Vinogradov and Flight Engineer Jeff Williams, are in Baikonur, Kazakhstan, awaiting launch. They are scheduled to lift off at 9:30 p.m. EST Wednesday, March 29. Managers reviewed preparations for the mission and approved moving forward with launch at the Soyuz Flight Readiness Review on Thursday. Although no spacewalk is planned from the station until July, managers also reviewed issues with spacewalking capability. They approved a temporary solution to allow a spacewalk if needed. The concern with U.S. spacewalks surfaced when engineers found blisters on handrail bars during production work on the ground. The finding led to an ongoing evaluation to ensure the handrails' strength is sufficient. The evaluation is expected to be completed by the end of April. Meanwhile, the approved procedure for spacewalks, if one were to be needed, involves attaching crew safety tethers at the base of the handrails rather than on the bar of the rails. Tokarev and McArthur also are continuing to look for Russian lithium hydroxide canisters on the station. The canisters are used to scrub carbon dioxide from Russian Orlan spacesuits and would be used if a spacewalk required using those suits. Regardless of the outcome of their search, a new supply of canisters will be carried to the station on a Progress cargo vehicle in April, and the next spacewalk planned using Russian spacesuits is set for August. Vinogradov and Williams are planned to dock to the station at 11:19 p.m. EST next Friday. They will be joined by Brazil's first astronaut, Marcos Pontes, for launch. Pontes will spend eight days on the station under a commercial agreement with the Russian Federal Space Agency and return home with McArthur and Tokarev. After a day of light duty and rest Tuesday, McArthur and Tokarev resumed normal operations, focusing on packing and preparing for the trip home. They packed personal items as well as hardware and science supplies that will return with them. They also continued several science experiments that study plants in weightlessness and crystal growth in space. The studies included work with the Russian Matroshka and PLANT experiments and two Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency experiments, the Granada Crystallization Facility and the Photon Crystals Growth Facility. McArthur disassembled and stowed components from the U.S. Foot/Ground Reaction Forces During Spaceflight experiment. The crew recently completed that study which investigated the effects of weightlessness on the legs and feet. McArthur took time to talk with students during two amateur radio sessions, one with the Sir James Lougheed Elementary School in Calgary, Alberta, Canada and a second with more than a thousand students in Rutigliano, Italy. McArthur has conducted 34 such sessions with students during his six months in orbit, more than any other station crew member.
- 2006 Mar 30 - International Space Station Status Report: SS06-013
The 13th crew of the International Space Station roared away today from Kazakhstan into orbit atop a Russian Soyuz rocket. Expedition 13 Commander Pavel Vinogradov, NASA Science Officer and Flight Engineer Jeff Williams and Brazilian Space Agency astronaut Marcos Pontes will dock to the station late Friday. Vinogradov and Williams will spend six months on the complex during Expedition 13. Pontes, flying under a commercial agreement with the Russian Federal Space Agency, will stay on the station for eight days. The 162-foot tall Soyuz rocket launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome at 9:30 p.m. EST. About 10 minutes later, the Soyuz was in orbit with its solar arrays and antennae extended. Docking is planned for 11:19 p.m. EST Friday. Vinogradov, Williams and Pontes will open hatches at about 12:30 a.m. EST Saturday to join Expedition 12 Commander Bill McArthur and Flight Engineer Valery Tokarev inside the space complex. The five space fliers will be available for a crew news conference at 10:55 a.m. EST Monday. Reporters at NASA's Johnson Space Center, Houston, Kennedy Space Center, Fla., and the Russian Mission Control Center in Korolev, Russia, may ask questions. The two crews will spend about a week handing over operations of the station, and Pontes will conduct a series of research investigations. McArthur, Tokarev and Pontes return to Earth April 8. At landing, McArthur and Tokarev will have spent almost 190 days in space. Earlier this week, McArthur found a supply of lithium hydroxide canisters used to scrub carbon dioxide from the air in Russian space suits during a spacewalk. The find ensures Russian suits can be used if a spacewalk is needed.
- 2006 Mar 30 - Soyuz TMA-8 Crew: Vinogradov, Williams Jeffrey, Pontes. Spacecraft: Soyuz TMA. Payload: Soyuz TMA s/n 218. Mass: 7,250 kg (15,980 lb). Launch Site: Baikonur. Launch Vehicle: Soyuz. Duration: 182.95 days. Perigee: 336 km (208 mi). Apogee: 349 km (216 mi). Inclination: 51.60 deg. Period: 91.40 min.
Soyuz TMA-8 docked with the Zarya nadir port of the ISS at 04:19 GMT on April 1. It undocked from Zarya on 28 September at 21:53 GMT, with the return crew of Vinogradov, Williams and space tourist Ansari aboard. It landed in Kazakhstan at 01:13 GMT on 29 September.
- 2006 Apr 1 - International Space Station Status Report: SS06-014
A new crew pulled into port at the International Space Station late Friday to start a six-month mission. With Expedition 13 and Soyuz Commander Pavel Vinogradov at the controls, the Soyuz TMA-8 spacecraft automatically linked up to the Earth-facing port on the station's Zarya module at 11:19 p.m. EST Friday. The spacecraft were above China near the Russian, Kazakh and Mongolian borders at the time. Aboard the Soyuz with Vinogradov were NASA Flight Engineer and Science Officer Jeff Williams and Brazilian Space Agency astronaut Marcos Pontes. Pontes will spend eight days on the complex under a commercial agreement with the Russian Federal Space Agency. After systems checks, hatches between the Soyuz and the station were opened at 12:59 a.m. EST Saturday. Expedition 12 Commander Bill McArthur and Flight Engineer Valery Tokarev, nearing the end of their six-month mission on the station, greeted their colleagues with handshakes and hugs and offered the traditional bread and salt. Russian, American and Brazilian dignitaries viewed the docking from the Russian Mission Control Center in Korolev, outside Moscow, and congratulated the crews after hatch opening. The new crew will now transfer cargo from the Soyuz to the station, deactivate the new Soyuz' systems and stow their launch and entry suits. Pontes will move his custom-made seatliner into the older Soyuz TMA-7 spacecraft that will bring him home, and he will begin several experiments. The two station crews will continue handover activities throughout the week, including robotics training with the station arm and detailed briefings on scientific experiments. Vinogradov and Williams will remain on board the station until September. All five astronauts and cosmonauts will participate in a news conference at 10:55 a.m. EDT Monday. NASA Television will broadcast this event live. Monday night, McArthur and Williams will "camp out" in the Quest airlock. They will sleep in the airlock, isolated from Tokarev, Vinogradov and Pontes, to test a new procedure that may reduce the preparation time for spacewalks. The new procedure will have spacewalkers stay in the airlock overnight at a lower air pressure to help purge nitrogen from their bodies to prevent decompression sickness. McArthur and Williams will begin their airlock stay at about 6:20 p.m. EDT Monday and finish at 3:30 a.m. EDT Tuesday. McArthur, Tokarev and Pontes will leave the station aboard the Soyuz TMA-7 and land April 8.
- 2006 Apr 6 - International Space Station Status Report: SS06-015
Camaraderie and hard work highlighted this week's joint operations on the International Space Station. Aboard the complex, one crew prepared for a return to Earth while another focused on taking the helm in orbit. Expedition 12 Commander Bill McArthur, Flight Engineer Valery Tokarev and Brazilian astronaut Marcos Pontes head home Saturday, closing hatches as they leave the station at 1:35 p.m. EDT. They will undock their Soyuz spacecraft at 4:28 p.m. EDT. That sets the stage for a deorbit burn at 6:58 p.m. EDT to drop the 15,000-pound spacecraft out of orbit. The Soyuz will parachute to a landing at 7:48 p.m. EDT on the steppes of Kazakhstan. Expedition 12's homecoming preparations began in earnest after last week's arrival of the 13th station crew, Commander Pavel Vinogradov and Flight Engineer Jeff Williams, who arrived with Pontes, Brazil's first astronaut. Pontes will have spent eight days on the station conducting experiments as part of a commercial agreement with the Russian Federal Space Agency. This week began with a partially completed "campout" by McArthur and Williams in the Quest Airlock. The planned overnight stay in the airlock tested procedures that can shorten the time needed to prepare for future spacewalks. Quest was sealed off from the rest of the station at 6:45 p.m. EDT Monday with McArthur and Williams inside, and its air pressure was later lowered to 10.2 pounds per square inch. The rest of the station remained at the normal air pressure of 14.7 pounds per square inch. An overnight stay at the lower air pressure helps purge nitrogen from the body, a necessary step to avoid decompression sickness. McArthur and Williams were awakened four hours into their sleep in the airlock by an error tone. The tone was generated by software that monitors the composition of air on the station. Flight controllers opted to end the campout test Tuesday at 12:43 a.m. EDT, open the airlock hatch to the station, and allow the crew to go back to sleep. Despite the glitch, all of the test objectives were achieved. Engineers are reviewing data to determine whether changes are needed to use the technique during the STS-115 shuttle mission later this year. Engineers could decide to repeat the test at another time. On Wednesday, Williams trained with the station's robot arm, Canadarm2. Late this week, McArthur briefed Williams on payload operations in the Destiny laboratory while Tokarev, the Soyuz commander, stowed equipment and payloads in the Soyuz for the trip home. Tokarev also reviewed procedures for the undocking, entry and landing with flight controllers at the Russian Mission Control Center outside Moscow.
- 2006 Apr 7 - International Space Station Status Report: SS06-016
After orbiting Earth more than 3,000 times during six months on the International Space Station, Expedition 12 Commander Bill McArthur and Flight Engineer Valery Tokarev returned to the planet Sunday morning in Kazakhstan. With them was Marcos Pontes, Brazil's first astronaut. The Soyuz spacecraft with McArthur, Tokarev and Pontes landed in central Kazakhstan, about 30 miles northeast of Arkalyk, at 7:48 p.m. EDT, Saturday. The crew's families will greet them at Star City, Russia, near Moscow, early Monday. McArthur and Tokarev will remain in Star City for post-flight debriefings before returning to Houston later this month. McArthur and Tokarev launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan, Sept. 30, 2005. They spent 189 days, 18 hours and 51 minutes in space. During their mission, they conducted two spacewalks and relocated their Soyuz spacecraft twice, becoming the first ISS crew to dock to every Russian docking port on the complex. They also became the first two-person station crew to conduct a spacewalk in both Russian and U.S. spacesuits. Pontes flew to the station with the Expedition 13 crew last week as part of a commercial agreement with the Russian Federal Space Agency, Roscosmos. He spent eight days on the station conducting experiments. The new station crew, Expedition 13 Commander Pavel Vinogradov and Flight Engineer and NASA Science Officer Jeff Williams, will have light duty for the next few days as they rest from a busy handover. They will remain in orbit for six months. The crew plans to perform two spacewalks and greet two space shuttle crews during their expedition. Joining them during their stay on the station will be Thomas Reiter, a European Space Agency astronaut from Germany, also flying under a commercial agreement with Roscosmos. Reiter is scheduled to come to the station on the Space Shuttle Discovery's STS-121 mission, targeted for a July launch. Reiter will be the first non-Russian, non-U.S. long-duration crew member on the station. His arrival will bring the station crew size to three for the first time since May 2003, when the crew size was reduced to conserve supplies in the wake of the Columbia accident. Shuttle Atlantis' STS-115 mission is also scheduled during Expedition 13 and will resume major assembly of the station. The shuttle and station crews will work together to add another set of batteries and solar arrays to the complex.
- 2006 Apr 8 - Landing of Soyuz TMA-7
- 2006 Apr 14 - International Space Station Status Report: SS06-017
The 13th crew of the International Space Station is wrapping up its first week flying solo in its new orbiting home. The crew's work has included station maintenance, medical and other experiments and standard daily exercise. Expedition 13 Commander Pavel Vinogradov and Flight Engineer and NASA Science Officer Jeff Williams said farewell to their predecessors last Saturday. The Expedition 12 crew and a visiting Brazilian astronaut undocked that afternoon and landed in Kazakhstan at 7:48 p.m. EDT. Vinogradov and Williams had light duty Sunday and Monday, a break after completing eight days of extensive handover activities with their counterparts. Maintenance work included a three-and-one-half hour scheduled replacement of station toilet components on Tuesday. Both crew members also took time to talk with two Russian news organizations and participants at a Russian school children's aerospace festival. On Wednesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin called the crew from the Kremlin. Putin's call came on the 45th anniversary of the first human spaceflight by Yuri Gagarin, a landmark event commemorated by the Russian holiday Cosmonautics Day. That date, April 12, was also the 25th anniversary of the first NASA space shuttle launch in 1981. Putin told the crew it was a pleasure to see representatives of the United States and Russia working together on the same spacecraft. During the light-hearted exchange, Vinogradov invited Putin to visit the space station. The crew continued loading the station's Progress cargo craft with trash and conducted physical evaluations and experiments Thursday. Vinogradov and Williams practiced an emergency evacuation drill Friday. Throughout the week, they had time to familiarize themselves with their new home. Vinogradov and Williams will remain in orbit for six months. During that time, they plan to welcome two space shuttles and perform two spacewalks. Shuttle Discovery's STS-121 mission, targeting a launch no earlier than July 1, will bring European Space Agency astronaut Thomas Reiter aboard the station. Reiter will increase the station crew size to three for the first time since May 2003 when the crew size was reduced to conserve station supplies following the Columbia accident. Back on Earth for almost a week, Expedition 12 Commander Bill McArthur and Flight Engineer Valery Tokarev remain in Star City, Russia, near Moscow. They continue to undergo debriefing and rehabilitation after 190 days in space. With them is Marcos Pontes, Brazil's first astronaut, who launched with Expedition 13. He returned to Earth with the Expedition 12 crew after spending about eight days on the station conducting experiments. Tentative plans call for McArthur to return to Houston later this month.
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