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| What it looks like from @Space Station when your best friend achieves her life long dream to go to space. Caught the second stage in progress! We can’t wait to welcome you onboard, crew of Soyuz 61! Credit: NASA/Christina Koch |
CAPE CANAVERAL, FL – Less than 24 hours apart a pair of critical crew and cargo spaceships successfully launched back to back to the International Space Station (ISS) on Tuesday and Wednesday, Sept. 24 & Sept. 25 – the Japanese HTV-8 cargo freighter from Japan and Russia’s Soyuz MS-15 crew vessel from Kazakhstan respectively, making for a hugely busy week of space action!
Thus the orbiting outpost is now temporarily home to 9 humans from 4 countries for the next week !! - living and working peacefully in space cooperatively for all humanity.
Carrying a new multinational trio of spaceflyers, the Russian Soyuz MS-15 spaceship blasted off at 9:57 a.m. EDT (6:57 p.m. Kazakhstan time) from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan with NASA astronaut Jessica Meir, Oleg Skripochka of the Russian space agency Roscosmos, and the first space traveler from the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Hazzaa Ali Almansoori.
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| NEW HOME IN SPACE: Screen shot of 9 Humans aboard #ISS Sept 25, 2019. After launch, docking and hatch opening NASA’s Jessica Meir, Roscosmos’ Oleg Skripochka and Roscosmos Spaceflight Participant Hazzaa Ali Almansoori arrive at the International Space Station after 4-orbit flight beginning 957 AM EDT. During welcome ceremony, the newest station residents greeted by astronauts Nick Hague, Andrew Morgan, Christina Koch and Luca Parmitano along with cosmonauts Alexey Ovchinin and Alexander Skvortsov. This is Meir's and Almansoori’s first spaceflight and Skripochka’s third. Credit: NASA TV/Ken Kremer/Spaceupclose.com |
The Roscosmos Soyuz docked at the million pound orbiting research complex at 3:42 p.m. EDT while soaring 264 miles over the south Pacific off the west coast of Chile. The entire launch and docking sequence was carried live on NASA TV.
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The Soyuz MS-15
spacecraft carrying Expedition 61 crew members Jessica Meir of NASA and Oleg
Skripochka of Roscosmos, and spaceflight participant Hazzaa Ali Almansoori of
the United Arab Emirates launches Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2019, from the Baikonur
Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Credits:
NASA/Bill Ingalls
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The Soyuz MS-15
spacecraft carrying Expedition 61 crew members Jessica Meir of NASA and Oleg
Skripochka of Roscosmos, and spaceflight participant Hazzaa Ali Almansoori of
the United Arab Emirates launches Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2019, from the Baikonur
Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Credits:
NASA/Bill Ingalls
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The Roscosmos Soyuz docked at the million pound orbiting
research complex at 3:42 p.m. EDT while soaring 264 miles over the south
Pacific off the west coast of Chile. The entire launch and docking sequence was carried live on NASA TV.
“Contact confirmed,” said the NASA TV commentator. Three new crew members are now docked to the ISS.”
After confirming a hard mate and closing all the hooks and latches and conducting leak checks the crews opened hatches between the Soyuz and the International Space Station and the new crew were welcomed aboard the orbiting laboratory at 6:12 p.m. ET Sept. 25.
“Contact confirmed,” said the NASA TV commentator. Three new crew members are now docked to the ISS.”
After confirming a hard mate and closing all the hooks and latches and conducting leak checks the crews opened hatches between the Soyuz and the International Space Station and the new crew were welcomed aboard the orbiting laboratory at 6:12 p.m. ET Sept. 25.
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| Russian Soyuz MS-15 spaceship with three crewmembers on final approach for docking at ISS on Sept. 25, 2019. Credit: NASA TV/Ken Kremer/Spaceupclose.com |
This is Meir's and Almansoori’s first spaceflight and Skripochka’s third.
The unusually high number of 9 crew on board is the most since 2015 since September 2015, when nine crew members were aboard for seven days during Scott Kelly and Mikhail Kornienko’s year-long mission.
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| Current configuration of the ISS with 5 visiting vehicles after the HTV-8 arrives. Credit: NASA |
With their departure Expedition 61 officially begins.
Overall Almansoori is the 10th spaceflight participant - under contracts with Roscosmos - and the first since 2009.
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| 239 people from 19 countries have now visited the International Space Station. Credit: NASA |
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Japan’s HTV-8 cargo
craft launches on time from the Tanegashima Space Center atop the H-IIB rocket at
12:05 p.m. EDT Tuesday, Sept. 24 (1:05 a.m. Sept. 25 in Japan) from the
Tanegashima Space Center in southern Japan. Credit: NASA TV
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A little more than 15 minutes after launch, the unpiloted H-II Transfer Vehicle-8 (HTV-8) cargo spacecraft successfully separated from the rocket and began its four-day rendezvous with the International Space Station.
The HTV-8 cargo freighter named Kounotori from JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) is packed with over four tons of crew supplies, station hardware and new science experiments.
It will arrive at the station Saturday.
“NASA astronauts Christina Koch and Andrew Morgan will capture Kounotori with the Canadarm2 robotic arm around 7:15 a.m. Ground controllers will then take over and remotely install the Japanese resupply ship to the Harmony module about three hours later,” says NASA.
This is the 8th HTV resupply ship to launch to the ISS. Among the cargo are six new Lithium-ion batteries that will be swapped out for old nickel-hydrogen batteries as part of the ISS power supply system during astronaut spacewalks in October.
Japan’s H-2B rocket from prime contractor Mitsubishi Heavy Industries stands 186-feet-tall (56.6-meters).
“The Expedition 61 crew will spend more than six months conducting about 250 science investigations in fields such as biology, Earth science, human research, physical sciences, and technology development. Work on the unique microgravity laboratory advances scientific knowledge and demonstrates new technologies, making research breakthroughs that will enable long-duration human and robotic exploration of the Moon and Mars,” says NASA.
“During Expedition 61, crew members will install new lithium-ion batteries for two of the station’s solar array power channels through a series of spacewalks. Later in the expedition, spacewalkers are scheduled to upgrade and repair the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer, a key science instrument housed outside the station to study dark matter and the origins of the universe.”
Watch for Ken’s continuing onsite coverage of NASA, SpaceX, ULA, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and more space and mission reports direct from the Kennedy Space Center, Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida and Wallops Flight Facility, Virginia.
Stay tuned here for Ken's continuing Earth and Planetary science and human spaceflight news: www.kenkremer.com –www.spaceupclose.com – twitter @ken_kremer – email: ken at kenkremer.com
Dr. Kremer is a research scientist and journalist based in the KSC area, active
in outreach and interviewed regularly on TV and radio about space topics.
………….
Ken’s photos are for
sale and he is available for lectures and outreach events
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| Russian Soyuz MS-15 spaceship with three crewmembers on final approach for docking at ISS on Sept. 25, 2019. Credit: NASA TV/Ken Kremer/Spaceupclose.com |
Great articl1e! Your posts are so interesting and I learn a lot from them.
ReplyDeleteThx Jean Wright for nice comment above
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