SpaceX Dragon Returns to Flight Bound for the International Space Station

The SpaceX Dragon capsule has successfully launched from Space Launch Complex 40 at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on a mission to deliver science to the International Space Station.

The Commercial Resupply Services(CRS)-8 launched atop a Falcon 9 rocket at 9:43 p.m. Eastern Time under clear skies carrying science research, crew supplies and hardware to the orbiting laboratory in support of the Expedition 47 and 48 crews.

Dragon on its eight flight to the International Space Station launches

atop a Falcon 9 rocket at 10:43 p.m. from Cape Canveral in Florida.

credit: SpaceX

Just minutes after first stage separation, the rocket's first stage fell back to Earth, fired its thrusters and deployed its landing legs before successfully landing upright for the first time on a barge at sea. Today marks the second time that Elon Musk's company has accomplished such a feat - the first coming back on December 21.

The vehicle will arrive at the space station on Sunday April 10 loaded with 6,900 pounds/3,130 kilograms of science and payload to further advance the research capabilities of the International Space Station. From the Cupola, ESA astronaut Tim Peake will capture Dragon with the station's robotic arm, Canadarm-2, before flight controllers in Mission Control in Houston berth Dragon to the Earth-facing port of the station's Harmony module a few hours later.

Today's launch marks the Return to Flight of Dragon having been lost shortly after liftoff on its seventh mission to resupply the complex in June 2015.

Sunday's arrival will be an historic one, as it marks the first time that two commercially-built cargo vehicles will be docked to the International Space Station simultaneously. Orbital ATK's Cygnus cargo craft is currently berthed to the Unity module of the ISS.

On April 15, robotic operators will once again take control of Canadarm-2 and remove the much anticipated Bigelow Expandable Activity Module(BEAM), and berth it to the aft port of the station's Tranquility module.

Bigelow Expandable Activity Module(BEAM)

BEAM is an expandable habitat built by Bigelow Aerospace that will remain on station for a period of two years. NASA and its partners are currently investigating the practicalities of using expandable habitats in the near-Earth environment as well as on future missions to the Moon or Mars.

This will be the first time an expandable habitat will be docked to the station, so the procedure will take some time, allowing teams to closely observe the expansion process as well as the safety of the crew and the station. During this time the module will expand from its packed dimensions of 7.75 feet in diameter and 5.7 feet long, to its pressurised size of 10,5 feet in diameter and 12 feet long.

The Bigelow Expandable Activity Module(BEAM) being loaded into the
trunk of the SpaceX Dragon capsule at Cape Canaveral. credit: NASA

The expandable module is made up of soft fabrics instead of metal which allows the habitat to be packed to a small volume during launch and later expanded to its full size in space. Two radiation sensors, temperature and micrometeorite impacts inside BEAM will help scientists and engineers to better understand thermal, radiation and long-term leak performance of expandable habitats.

The habitat will be inflated by the crew at the end of May and it is expected that crew members will enter BEAM twice or three times per six month increment to swap out sensors that need to be returned to Earth for analysis.

The arrival of Dragon on Sunday will bring to an end the recent period of busy traffic to and from the International Space Station. CRS-8 will be the fourth visiting vehicle to visit the laboratory in as many weeks, following the arrival of the Soyuz TMA-20M, Cygnus CRS OA-6 and the Progress 63P.

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Progress Cargo Ship Launches to Resupply Space Station

The Russian Progress M-28M cargo vehicle has successfully launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, marking the beginning of a two day-long commute to resupply the International Space Station.

The Progress lifted off from Pad 1A at the Baikonur Cosmodrome at 5:55 a.m. Irish Time carrying 2,381kg of food, fuel and supplies for the crew of Expedition 44.

Progress M-28M launched from Baikonur at 5:55 a.m.
Credit: Roscosmos 

After a flawless ride into orbit aboard a Soyuz-U rocket, the Progress separated from the rocket's third stage after eight minutes and forty-nine seconds of powered flight, deploying its antennas and solar arrays a short time later. 

Initial views from video cameras on board the Progress confirmed that everything was nominal and that all systems were "Go" for mission controllers in Korolev in Moscow to send commands to the vehicle to perform a series of orbital manoeuvres to reach the International Space Station.

Progress is scheduled to dock with the Pirs Docking Compartment on the Russian segment of the orbiting complex at 8:13 a.m. on Sunday morning.

This morning's launch comes just two months after the Progress M-27M was lost after the vehicle went into an uncontrolled spin and burned up in the Earth's atmosphere several days later.

It also comes in the wake of the disintegration of a Falcon 9 rocket carrying a SpaceX Dragon capsule to resupply the station just 139 seconds into flight on June 28.

In a NASA public affairs event yesterday, astronaut Scott Kelly was asked how the crew were feeling ahead of the launch of this latest Progress; "Third time's a charm I hope. We're hoping that we get this one obviously.. If these next two get delayed or move out beyond September or October it will cause problems but we're as confident as we can be."

Progress will spend several months docked to the International Space Station before it is loaded with waste, undocked and sent to burn up in the Earth's atmosphere.

Today's launch will be followed in August by a Japanese HTV flight. Orbital ATK is moving ahead with plans for its next launch later this year.

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Failed Russian Progress Resupply Ship Burns Up In Atmosphere

The Russian Progress M-27M cargo spacecraft which failed to dock with the International Space Station last month has re-entered the Earth's atmosphere at 02:20 UTC over the Pacific Ocean.
Having launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on April 28 and loaded with over three tonnes of fuel, food and cargo for the orbiting complex, Russian Mission Control declared that they were experiencing propulsion, telemetry and communications issues with the spacecraft shortly after it separated from the Soyuz rocket.

File photo of a Progress Resupply Ship
credit: NASA TV

Video cameras installed on the vehicle showed that it had entered into an uncontrolled spin of roughly one rotation every four to five seconds. All attempts by Russian ground controllers to regain control of the vehicle were unsuccessful, and the decision was made to cancel the planned docking to the station on Wednesday April 29 when it ecame apparent that rendezvous and docking would not be possible.

The crew aboard the station in the meantime are doing well and have sufficient supplies on board to last for over four months. Expedition 43 Flight Engineer and ISS One Year Crew member Scott Kelly of NASA spoke with the Associated Press recently about the problems with the Progress,
"The important thing is that hardware can be replaced.. and we'll continue to operate the space station."

The next cargo ship on the manifest to visit the station will be a SpaceX Dragon resupply ship. This will be the company's seventh resupply mission to the station, scheduled to launch from Florida on June 19.

In the meantime, the Russian Federal Space Agency(Roscosmos) will be investigating the incident in order to find athe root cause of the anomaly. The Progress M-27M was the 150th Russian space freighter launched into space, and is only the second one to have suffered a casatrophic/major malfunction during its mission to resupply the ISS. In August 2011 a system error with the Soyuz rocket prevented the vehicle from reaching orbit.



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Progress Resupply Ship Docks with Space Station

The Russian Progress M-26M resupply ship, carrying 3.1 tons of cargo, has successfully docked with the International Space Station.

Docking obetween the Progress and the aft port of the Zvezda Service Module occurred at 16:57 GMT as the International Space Station flew 257 miles above the Atlantic Ocean.

Current configuration of the station's Russian Segment
image credit: Space Shuttle Almanac

This afternoon's docking comes just six hours after the Progress lifted off atop a Soyuz rocket under overcast skies from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

The arrival of the Progress comes in the midst of a very busy traffic period for visiting vehicles at the orbiting complex. Just this past Sunday(February 15), Europe's final Automated Transfer Vehicle vacated the aft port of Zvezda after spending six months docked there.

Inside the International Space Station, preparations are being made on the US Segment of the station for a trio of spacewalks which will be conducted by Expedition 42 commander Butch Wilmore and Flight Engineer Terry Virts of NASA. The first of the three Extra Vehicular Activities(EVAs) will commence on Friday, February 20.

But before all that, after a series of leak checks have been conducted between the newly-arrived Progress and station, the crew will open the hatch and begin unloading over 3,300 lbs of cargo on Wednesday morning.

Progress M-26M is expected to remain on board the station until late August.

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ISS Monthly Recap for July 2014

The six person Expedition 40 crew aboard the International Space Station have wrapped up a very busy month conducting various robotics operations, and a record amount of science and research aboard the orbiting laboratory.

Humans have been living on the ISS for over 5,000 consecutive days

The month began with astronauts in the US segment of the station carrying out maintenance on the Carbon Dioxide Removal Assembly(CDRA). CDRA is responsible for taking unwanted carbon dioxide in the station's atmosphere out of air circulation. This is important in developing systems for removing CO2 from astronauts' breathing air on missions to Mars and beyond in future spacecraft like NASA's Orion Capsule, which will make its first test flight later this year.

July 12 marked the historic milestone of 5,000 days of humans living aboard the International Space Station. Since the first launch of the Expedition 1 crew back in November 2000, over 24,000 hours of science have been conducted aboard the orbiting lab over 40 expeditions. Coincidentally, the current crew aboard the station set a record in July for the amount of science conducted during a week. The six astronauts and cosmonauts completed 82 hours worth of science and research, which will benefit people back on Earth, as well astronauts living in space.

July was a busy month also for the arrival and departures of cargo spacecraft.
On July 16, the Orbital Sciences Cygnus cargo craft arrived at the International Space Station. After launching from the Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia on July 13. Expedition 40 commander Steve Swanson and Flight Engineer Alexander Gerst supervised the rendezvous and docking procedures three days later on the 16th. Hatches between the ISS and Cygnus were opened on the following morning.

The arrival of Cygnus was followed up by the departure of the Russian Progress 55 resupply ship, which undocked from the station's Pirs Docking Compartment on July 21. 

Cygnus is captured by the station's robotic arm on July 16.

And we all know that things just wouldn't be the same at the ISS if there wasn't a Progress attached. So that's why just a couple of days later the Progress 56 resupply ship launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, arriving at station on July 24- just six hours after launch.

Finally, in the wee hours of the morning of July 30, the European Space Agency's Automated Transfer Vehicle launched from the Kourou Space Center in French Guiana on the final mission of the ATV programme. 

ATV-5, which is named after Belgian astronomer George Lemaitre, will spend the next two weeks making its way to the station before it's automated docking to the Zvezda Service Module on August 12.

In summary, July was a very eventful, busy and successful month aboard the International Space Station. With all this new cargo aboard, August has all the makings of being yet another very busy and exciting month aboard the ISS with a series of spacewalks planned for mid-August, along with the arrival of George Lemaitre to the International Space Station.

Progress Resupply Ship Redocks With ISS After 2 Days of Tests

The Russian Progress 53 resupply cargo craft, which departed the International Space Station on April 23, has re-docked with the orbiting laboratory after conducting tests on a new automated rendezvous system.

A view of the International Space Station taken from Progress external cameras

The Progress cargo ship, which undocked from the aft end of the station's Zvezda Service Module on Wednesday April 23, completed important tests and evaluations of its automated rendezvous and docking system, before re-docking with the station's Russian segment at 13:13 Irish Time this afternoon, as the ISS flew 260 miles high over eastern Kazakhstan.

During testing, teams on the ground in the Russian Mission Control Room near Moscow commanded the Progress to back away to a distance of 500km(311 miles) from the ISS.

The Progress completed today's automated docking using the new KURS-NA rendezvous system, which uses just a single antenna, allowing four others to be removed. It is hoped that if these tests are satisfactory, then future Progress vehicles will be lighter, use less power, and possess updated electronics. This will in turn allow more cargo to be transported to the International Space Station.

Today's redocking comes just two days after NASA astronauts Rick Mastracchio and Steve Swanson successfully completed a spacewalk which lasted just over an hour and a half to replace a faulty computer outside of the station.

As for the Progress, the Expedition 39 crew will open the hatches between the craft and the station, then fill it with trash and other unwanted items no longer needed, before it undocks from the station for a final time on June 9 to burn up in the Earth's atmosphere.

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Astronauts Complete Spacewalk to Replace Faulty Space Station Computer

NASA astronauts Rick Mastracchio and Steve Swanson have successfully completed a short spacewalk to replace a faulty computer aboard the International Space Station.

Rick Mastracchio and Steve Swanson
credit: NASA

The station's backup computer, or Multiplexer/Demultiplexer(MDM) failed during routine testing on April 11, prompting teams on the ground to plan for today's contingency Extra-Vehicular Activity(EVA) by Mastracchio and Swanson.

Even though the second computer is still functioning normally, the faulty MDM, which is responsible for sending commands to some of the space station's systems including the cooling system, solar alpha rotary joints and mobile transporter rail car, needed to be replaced.

The spacewalking duo, with nearly eighty spacewalking hours between them, began their excursion at 14:26 Irish Time and exited the station's Quest Airlock soon afterwards. The pair soon got to work on the task in hand, as they made their way over to the work site on the station's S0 Truss.

Working harmoniously together, Mastracchio, who now ranks sixth on the all time list of cumulative hours spent on an Extra Vehicular Activity, made light work of removing and replacing the faulty MDM with Swanson. Upon its removal from S0, Mastracchio reported that he had in his possession, "An MDM, slightly used."

After today's EVA, Mastracchio tweeted this picture saying:
"In front of the Japanese modules on today's EVA. Not a selfie."

The pair swiflty began the installation of the replacement MDM, which has been stowed inside the Destiny Module of the ISS since April 2001. Altogether there are 45 MDMs aboard the orbiting complex.

With the new MDM installed, teams back on Earth in the Mission Control Center in Houston began conducting preliminary tests of the computer, and not long after, Mastracchio and Swanson were given the good news that the installation had been successful and that everything was working fine.

Just over two hours after beginning today's spacewalk, the pair began to head back to the Quest Airlock, wrapping up today's contingency spacewalk, which lasted just over two hours.

Today's spacewalk comes just hours after the Progress M-21M cargo ship un-docked from the aft end of the Zvezda Service Module to test its KURS automated docking system. The Progress will back away to a distance of 311 miles from the space station, before it redocks with Zvezda early on Friday morning.

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Progress 52 Resupply Ship Docks to ISS

An unpiloted Russian cargo ship carrying nearly three tons of supplies for the Expedition 36 crew docked to the International Space Station less than six hours after launch Saturday.

The ISS Progress 52 resupply ship docked with the station’s Pirs docking compartment at 10:26 p.m. EDT, delivering 1,212 pounds of propellant, 42 pounds of oxygen, 62 pounds of air, 926 pounds of water and 3,395 pounds of spare parts, maintenance equipment and experiment hardware. Included in the cargo are tools identified for possible repairs to the U.S. spacesuits on the station. At the time of docking Progress 52 and the station were flying 260 miles over the Pacific Ocean approaching the west coast of South America.

The space freighter launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 4:45 p.m. EDT (2:45 a.m. Sunday Kazakhstan time) on an accelerated, four-orbit journey to rendezvous with the station. At the time of launch, the station was flying 260 miles over southern Russia near the border between Kazakhstan and Mongolia.

 See the launch of the Progress 52 here

Progress 52 Approaches the ISS prior to docking
credit: NASA

The docking port on Pirs was previously occupied by the ISS Progress 50 cargo craft, which departed Thursday after spending five months at the station.

The crew will conduct a series of leak checks at the Pirs docking interface before opening the Progress hatch to begin the long process of unloading the cargo.

Once emptied of its cargo, Progress 52 will be filled with trash and station discards and then undocked later this year for a destructive re-entry into Earth’s atmosphere.