Skip to main content

Crew Prepares for Space Shuttle Endeavour’s Arrival

After Thursday’s relocation of the Soyuz TMA-14 spacecraft and off-duty time over the weekend, the International Space Station’s Expedition 20 crew returned to work Monday, focusing on preparations for the arrival of space shuttle Endeavour later this month.

Commander Gennady Padalka and Flight Engineer Mike Barratt practiced photography techniques with digital cameras that they will use during Endeavour’s approach to the station to collect high-resolution imagery of the shuttle’s heat shield. The entire station crew spent time packing items to be returned to Earth aboard the shuttle at the end of its mission.

Endeavour is slated to launch July 11 from Kennedy Space Center, Fla. to begin the STS-127 mission. The shuttle crew will deliver the final elements of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s Kibo laboratory and will return Flight Engineer Koichi Wakata to Earth. STS-127 Mission Specialist Timothy Kopra will stay behind and replace Wakata.

Padalka, Barratt and Wakata conducted Soyuz descent training with Russian specialists to maintain proficiency on systems used for entry and landing in their Soyuz vehicle.



Wakata also replaced some components in the Waste Hygiene Compartment as part of its regular maintenance.

Flight Engineer Bob Thirsk – with help from Flight Engineer Frank De Winne – worked with the Integrated Cardiovascular (ICV) experiment in the Columbus laboratory. ICV researches the extent of cardiac atrophy and seeks to identify its mechanisms.

Flight Engineer Roman Romanenko performed maintenance on the ventilation system in the station’s Russian segment, cleaning fan screens and air ducts.

Padalka, Barratt and Wakata undocked the Soyuz from the aft port of the Zvezda service module at 5:29 p.m. EDT Thursday and piloted it over to the Pirs docking compartment, redocking the vehicle at 5:55 p.m. The move clears the way for the arrival of the ISS Progress 34 supply ship, which is scheduled to arrive later this month.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Kerala boat tragedy: Thirty five bodies have been fished out of the water

THEKKADY / KOCHI: A thick veil of grief descended on the famed tourist spot of Thekkady on Wednesday when Kerala witnessed its worst ever boat tragedy in the Mullaperiyar waters as the KTDC’s Jalakanyaka, carrying about 76 passengers, sank. Thirty five bodies have been fished out of the water. Any hope of finding more tourists alive faded with the daylight even as rescue personnel continued their desperate search. The two-deck boat, commissioned just a month back, was returning to the boat landing after an hour-long sight-seeing trip when tragedy struck. All the passengers on the upper deck apparently rushed to one side of the boat to take photos of a lone bison spotted on the shore. At the same time many from the lower deck flocked to the top leaving the lower almost empty. This movement and the uneven distribution of weight caused the boat to overbalance and turn turtle. Those remaining on the lower deck were trapped inside while about 20 on the upper deck were rescued by other boa

Special Status For Jammu & Kashmir Scraped: 5 Points About Article 370

Jammu & Kashmir will also be "reorganized," Home Minister Amit Shah said as talks about the state being trifurcated into three separate fields- Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh NEW DELHI: Article 370, which gives Jammu & Kashmir unique status, will be withdrawn this morning in parliament, Home Minister Amit Shah said . The announcement came after his cabinet meeting at his house this morning was held by Prime Minister Narendra Modi . Article 370 is a ' temporary provision ' granting special autonomous status to Jammu & Kashmir . It allows the state to draft its own Constitution and restricts the legislative powers of the parliament over the state. The government therefore requires state government approval for all legislation, except those related to defence, foreign affairs, finance, and communications. Parliament can not also improve or decrease the boundaries of the State under Article 370 As a consequence, citizens of Jammu & Kashmir

Enai Nokki Paayum Thotta Movie Review: Tiring and Unsatisfying

Movie Rating: 3/5 First of all things! The director's weakest film is the long delayed Enai Noki Paayum Thotta by Gautham Menon . The film's main weakness is the director's fascination with narrative style voice-over. It was good before Gautham used voice-over as a medium to tell his stories, but every scene in Enai Nokki Paayum Thotta begins and ends with Dhanush's voice-over, which irritates us after a point. The film is filled with tired stereotypes, and at a runtime of 157 minutes it is an unsatisfying watch. Like any other movie from Gautham Menon, here too hero Raghu (Dhanush) is a student of engineering, but this time his wife is not a student, but a film heroine Lekha ( Mega Akash ).She tells him she is not interested in movies and her boss Kuberan (Senthil Veeraswamy) coerced her into the profession for money (it looks like the girl is an orphan and Kuberan supported her studies and is her guardian). Raghu takes her to his Pollachi house and introduc