{"id":13768,"date":"2018-06-03T01:30:46","date_gmt":"2018-06-02T17:30:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/one-station-crew-heads-home-another-preps-for-launch\/"},"modified":"2018-06-03T01:30:46","modified_gmt":"2018-06-02T17:30:46","slug":"one-station-crew-heads-home-another-preps-for-launch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/one-station-crew-heads-home-another-preps-for-launch\/","title":{"rendered":"One station crew heads home, another preps for launch"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
Japanese astronaut Norishige Kanai (upper left), Russian commander Anton Shkaplerov (bottom), and NASA flight engineer Scott Tingle (right) are set to return to Earth Sunday aboard the Soyuz MS-07 spacecraft. Credit: NASA\/JAXA<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

With three space station fliers heading home Sunday after a 168-day mission, three fresh crew members made final preparations for launch three days later to boost the lab\u2019s crew back to six in a rapid-fire rotation that will prevent any major interruption of research activity.<\/p>\n

Soyuz MS-07\/53S commander Anton Shkaplerov, NASA flight engineer Scott Tingle and Japanese physician-astronaut Norishige Kanai plan to strap into their ferry ship and undock from the station\u2019s Earth-facing Rassvet module at 5:16 a.m. EDT (GMT-4) Sunday, leaving Expedition 56 commander Drew Feustel, Ricky Arnold and Oleg Artemyev behind.<\/p>\n

Launched last Dec. 17, Shkaplerov and his crewmates plan to fire their braking rockets for four minutes and 40 seconds starting at 7:47 a.m., slowing the ship by 286 mph and dropping the far side of the orbit deep into the atmosphere<\/p>\n

If all goes well, the central crew module will make a parachute-and-rocket-assisted touchdown on the steppe of Kazakhstan near the town of Dzhezkazgan at 8:40 a.m. After initial medical checks, Tingle and Kanai will be flown back to the Johnson Space Center in Houston while Shkaplerov will head to Star City near Moscow for debriefing.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t believe that Expedition 55 is already over,\u201d Tingle wrote in a recent blog entry. \u201cLast night we had our last movie night. The entire crew gathered in Node 2 and watched \u2018Avengers Infinity Wars\u2019 (sic) on the big screen. We enjoy each other\u2019s company \u2026 and this was a welcome break from the daily grind of trying to complete the required stowage, maintenance and science activities while preparing for departure.\u201d<\/p>\n

During his last full weekend in space, Tingle said, \u201cI gave myself a haircut. We usually clean our spaces each weekend to make sure we can maintain a decent level of organization, efficiency and morale. This weekend is no different, and it is time for me to vacuum out all of our filters and vents. You\u2019d be amazed at what we find!\u201d<\/p>\n

During a brief change-of-command ceremony Friday, Shkaplerov thanked Feustel\u2019s crew for its support and turned over a ceremonial key to the outpost.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been three months since we started Expedition 55 (when) I took command of the space station,\u201d Shkaplerov said. \u201cWe are going to return to the Earth. \u2026 I want to say thank you very much, Drew, Ricky and Oleg, for your friendship, for your help every day. My crewmates, my space brothers, I\u2019m very proud to be part of our Soyuz crew.\u201d<\/p>\n

Feustel thanked Shkaplerov in return \u201cfor welcoming us to the ISS, taking care of us, making sure we were ready to work when we arrived, you made the transition seamless.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe appreciate your patience and your guidance and your leadership, and we look forward to a safe and soft landing for you,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

With touchdown, Tingle and Kanai, both completing their first spaceflight, will have logged 168 days in space during a voyage spanning 2,688 orbits and 71.2 million miles since launch. Shkaplerov, a veteran of two earlier station visits totaling a full year, will have logged 532 days off planet.<\/p>\n

All three men carried out a single spacewalk each during their stay, welcomed four visiting vehicles \u2014 one Soyuz and three unpiloted cargo ships \u2014 and oversaw the departure of a like number, along with carrying out a full slate of scientific research.<\/p>\n

With the departure of Shkaplerov and his crewmates, Feustel, Arnold and Artemyev, launched to the station March 21 aboard the Soyuz MS-08 spacecraft, will have the lab to themselves for just five days before a fresh crew arrives.<\/p>\n

Soyuz MS-09\/55S commander Sergey Prokopyev, German flight engineer Alexander Gerst, representing the European Space Agency, and NASA physician-astronaut Serena Au\u00f1\u00f3n-Chancellor are scheduled for launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, 250 miles southwest of Dzhezkazgan, at 7:12 a.m. (5:12 p.m. local time) Wednesday.<\/p>\n

\"\"
NASA astronaut Serena Au\u00f1\u00f3n-Chancellor, Soyuz commander Sergey Prokopyev, and European Space Agency astronaut Alexander Gerst are set for launch Wednesday from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Credit: NASA\/Victor Zelentsov<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Climbing directly into the plane of the space station\u2019s orbit, the Soyuz will be released from its carrier rocket eight minutes and 45 seconds after liftoff. Over the next two days, Prokopyev and Gerst will monitor an automated rendezvous, catching up with the space station early Friday. They plan to dock at Rassvet around 9:07 a.m.<\/p>\n

After a traditional video chat with friends and family back in Moscow, the new arrivals will be given a safety briefing before all six crew members get down to work.<\/p>\n

Gerst spent 165 days aboard the station in 2014, but Prokopyev and Au\u00f1\u00f3n-Chancellor will be making their first flights.<\/p>\n

Au\u00f1\u00f3n-Chancellor, a veteran flight surgeon, originally was assigned to a mission later this year, but she was moved up to the Soyuz MS-09 crew after one of its original crew members, astronaut Jeanette Epps, was suddenly bumped from the Prokopyev-Gerst crew in January.<\/p>\n

NASA provided no explanation for the late crew swap, Epps had no public comment and Au\u00f1\u00f3n-Chancellor would only say she planned to be ready for launch despite an accelerated training schedule and that she already was on good terms with her new crewmates.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a relatively short amount of time from the crew assignment, but I\u2019ve known these guys for a very long time,\u201d she said. \u201cAlex and I were selected in the very same (astronaut) class and even from the beginning, when I started training in Russia, I\u2019d also met Sergey. So, for us, in all honesty, this is like one big family. It was not uncomfortable at all, it was extremely smooth.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like I\u2019ve been working with these guys forever,\u201d she added. \u201cIt\u2019s been very easy. \u2026 Our families have gotten together several times. It\u2019s been a lot of fun.\u201d<\/p>\n

Au\u00f1\u00f3n-Chancellor came to NASA in 2006, working as a contract flight surgeon. She spent more than nine months in Star City supporting medical operations with space station crew members and participated in water survival training in Ukraine.<\/p>\n

After selection as a NASA astronaut in 2009, she spent two months in Antarctica searching for meteorites as part of a scientific expedition and later served as an aquanaut aboard the Aquarius underwater laboratory.<\/p>\n

In a satellite interview with CBS News during final training in Moscow shortly before departing for Baikonur, Au\u00f1\u00f3n-Chancellor said she was well prepared and looking forward to launch.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Soyuz is a wonderfully robust and redundant vehicle,\u201d she said. \u201cThe great thing is the Russians have been flying a very long time, just like we have, and we\u2019ve been flying together for a very long time. They do a great job here in Star City preparing an international crew \u2026 to act in an operational environment and follow all the same rules and procedures to make sure that mission is successful.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for the safety and reliability of the Russian ferry ship, \u201cI have complete faith in the Soyuz,\u201d she said. \u201cIt is a wonderfully robust vehicle.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gerst said he was excited about getting a second chance to fly in space.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverybody who\u2019s flown to space wants to go back,\u201d he said. \u201cBeing in space is such a special feeling, you can\u2019t even put it down to only one thing. It\u2019s not only the floating, it\u2019s not only the looking out at this beautiful planet, it\u2019s not only the perspective that we have, it\u2019s more knowing where we are.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before his first flight, he said, \u201cI saw space as something very special, I thought this is a very special place to go to. When I was up there, I actually learned it was the opposite. Space is everywhere out there, the universe is gigantic, it\u2019s black and empty. Of course, there are quite a few interesting places to go, like moon and Mars, and we will go there, but most of it is empty.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo the real special place, and that\u2019s what you realize in space, is actually our planet Earth,\u201d Gerst said. \u201cSeeing that from the outside, seeing that from a step back, made me realize that. That was a very beautiful thought.\u201d<\/p>\n

Au\u00f1\u00f3n-Chancellor said she looked forward to conducting a variety of medical research to find out how she personally is affected by the rigors of the space environment.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou hear all these stories about how people feel, the fluid shift they feel in their bodies, everything in those first few days of flight,\u201d she said. \u201cSo the first kind of big experiment is almost my own case study where I look at myself and see how I react and maybe compare that with those of my colleagues.\u201d<\/p>\n

She also is interested in studying vision changes in astronauts who spend long periods in weightlessness, a relatively recent discovery.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we don\u2019t give the body enough credit for how well it does with very low-level chronic insults,\u201d she said. \u201cWhat I mean by that is how well the body is with adapting to low-level radiation, levels of carbon dioxide that are maybe a little higher on station than they are on Earth, a change in nutrition, microgravity itself. The body does a fantastic job adapting, but you still see markers of that. So what markers are we missing?\u201d<\/p>\n

Gerst, who holds a Ph.D. in geophysics, also is a fan of biological research, especially an experiment designed to chart changes in brain structure before, during and after a long-duration space flight.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we\u2019re up there in the space station it\u2019s a little bit like what people suffer after having a stroke, which is certain regions of the brain are not working properly anymore,\u201d he said. \u201cFor us up there in space, that\u2019s the sense of balance, our orthostatic senses are not completely working anymore, the brain has to compensate for that.\u201d<\/p>\n

It compensates by getting orientation cues from the eyes.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat switch over is very similar to what people experience when they have a stroke and have to re-learn how to walk, to speak, all those things,\u201d Gerst said. \u201cThe processes are similar, and we hope to study them. \u2026 For us, luckily, (those changes are) reversible, but we hope we can use that to develop a treatment for people on Earth.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Japanese astronaut Norishige Kanai (upper left), Russian commander Anton Shkaplerov (bottom), and NASA flight engineer Scott Tingle (right) are set to return to Earth Sunday aboard the Soyuz MS-07 spacecraft. Credit: NASA\/JAXA With three space station fliers heading home Sunday after a 168-day mission, three fresh crew members made final preparations for launch three days […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[2799,1723,1601,831,2938,2800,1545,717],"class_list":["post-13768","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-alexander-gerst","tag-anton-shkaplerov","tag-baikonur-cosmodrome","tag-european-space-agency","tag-expedition-55","tag-expedition-56","tag-human-spaceflight","tag-international-space-station"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13768"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13768"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13768\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13768"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13768"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13768"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}