• Forum
• SITREP
• Military
• WMD
• Intelligence
• Homeland Security

• Space

• Introduction
• Systems
• Facilities
• Agencies
• Countries
• Hot Documents
• News
• Reports
• Policy
• Budget
• Congress
• Links

• Public Eye

New Crew Docks with International Space Station

03 April 2006

First Brazilian astronaut visits station for eight days

Washington – A new crew docked at the International Space Station late March 31 to start a six-month mission.

With Expedition 13 and Soyuz Commander Pavel Vinogradov at the controls, the Russian Soyuz spacecraft automatically linked up to the Earth-facing port on the station's Zarya module. At the time, the spacecraft and the space station were above China near the Russian, Kazakh and Mongolian borders, according to an April 1 NASA press release.

Aboard the Soyuz with Vinogradov were NASA Flight Engineer and Science Officer Jeffrey Williams and Brazilian Space Agency astronaut Marcos Pontes. Pontes will spend eight days on the complex under a commercial agreement with Roscosmos, the Russian Federal Space Agency. (See related article.)

Hatches between the Soyuz and the station were opened after systems checks, and Expedition 12 Commander Bill McArthur and Flight Engineer Valery Tokarev greeted their colleagues with handshakes and hugs and offered bread and salt, a traditional Russian symbol of welcome.

Russian, American and Brazilian dignitaries viewed the docking from the Russian Mission Control Center in Korolev, outside Moscow, and congratulated the crews.

The new crew will 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 seat liner into an older Soyuz spacecraft that will take him home, and he will begin several experiments.

All astronauts who ride in Soyuz spacecraft have custom seat liners that fit their body contours when they are wearing their launch and entry spacesuits. This helps give them a tight fit in the dynamic launch environment and, on return to Earth, the potentially violent Soyuz ground landing. In contrast, the U.S. Apollo series spacecraft developed during the same period as the Soyuz used water landings; the U.S. space shuttles land on runways in a fashion similar to conventional aircraft.

The two station crews will continue handover activities throughout the week, including detailed briefings on scientific experiments and robotics training on the station's Canadarm2, a robotic arm that can handle large payloads and help with docking maneuvers.

TESTING OF JOINT AIRLOCK MODULE

On April 3, McArthur and Williams will "camp out" in the Quest airlock.

The Quest Joint Airlock Module is the main space station airlock, designed to be able to host spacewalks with the American and Russian spacesuits. It was needed because American suits will not fit through a Russian airlock hatch.

Quest offers an environment where astronauts can stay before a spacewalk in a reduced-nitrogen atmosphere to purge nitrogen from their bloodstream and avoid decompression sickness in the pure-oxygen atmosphere of the spacesuit. The airlock is 5.5 meters long, has a diameter of 4 meters and encompasses 34 cubic meters of space.

McArthur and Williams will sleep in the airlock, isolated from Tokarev, Vinogradov and Pontes, to test a new procedure that might reduce preparation time for spacewalks.

McArthur, Tokarev and Pontes will leave the station aboard the Soyuz and land April 8. Vinogradov and Williams will remain on board the station until September.

Information about crew's activities aboard the space station, future launch dates, and station sighting opportunities from anywhere on the Earth is available at the NASA Web site.

(Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)