[sarex] ISS Status Report: SS07-02

[Arthur Rowe]

SUBMITTED BY ARTHUR N1ORC - AMSAT A/C #31468

Jan. 12, 2007
> Grey Hautaluoma
> Headquarters, Washington
> 202-358-0668
>
> James Hartsfield 
> Johnson Space Center, Houston 
> 281-483-5111 
> STATUS REPORT: SS07-02
>
> INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION STATUS REPORT: SS07-02
>
> HOUSTON - After a three-day holiday to celebrate the Russian Orthodox 
> Christmas, astronauts on the International Space Station spent the 
> week packing trash into the Progress 22 cargo craft and unpacking 
> items delivered by Progress 23 as they prepared for the arrival of 
> new supplies.
>
> Packed with discarded items no longer needed on the outpost, Progress 
> 22 will undock from the station's Pirs Docking Compartment next 
> Tuesday at 5:28 p.m. CST. Its engines will be fired three hours later 
> to send it back into the atmosphere, where it will burn up. 
>
> The station crew, Commander Michael Lopez-Alegria and Flight Engineers 
> Mikhail Tyurin and Suni Williams, geared up for the docking of ISS 
> Progress 24 at Pirs, which is slated for Friday, Jan. 19 at 9 p.m. 
> CST. Progress 24 will launch on Wednesday, Jan. 17, from the Baikonur 
> Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 8:12 p.m. CST.
>
> The new Russian cargo ship will bring about 2.5 tons of food, fuel, 
> oxygen and supplies to the complex, including clothing and spacewalk 
> hardware for the next resident crew that will arrive at the station 
> in April.
>
> In preparation for the undocking of Progress 22, Tyurin disassembled 
> and removed the docking mechanism in the hatchway between the cargo 
> craft and the docking compartment. The mechanism will be returned to 
> Earth on Space Shuttle Atlantis' mission to the complex in March. 
>
> During the week, the crew worked for several hours in the Zvezda 
> Service Module on a major systems replacement task, trained on the 
> Robotics Onboard Trainer and relocated it to a new rack in the 
> Destiny lab. They also repaired and tested a Russian exercise 
> machine. 
>
> Tyurin also performed maintenance on a Russian ergometer and removed 
> the volatile organic analyzer from the Crew Health Care Systems rack 
> to prepare it for routine maintenance. The analyzer is used to 
> identify and quantify a targeted list of organic compounds in the 
> station atmosphere. He spent time on two Russian experiments, one 
> that studies locomotor system disorders in weightlessness and one 
> that studies the effect of spaceflight on the growth and development 
> of plants.
>
> Also during the week, Lopez-Alegria completed taking samples and 
> documented his daily diet for his mid-mission session on a renal 
> stone experiment. This experiment examines the risk of renal, or 
> kidney stone formation in crew members pre-flight, in-flight and 
> post-flight. In this study, potassium citrate tablets are 
> administered to astronauts, and multiple urine samples are taken 
> before, during and after spaceflight to evaluate the risk of renal 
> stone formation. Lopez-Alegria is the final subject to complete the 
> experiment.
>
> Lopez-Alegria and Williams took the WinSCAT, a cognitive test battery 
> used during space missions. The WinSCAT helps to assess the effects 
> on performance of behavioral stress induced by workload demands. 
>
> The astronauts also tested emergency light power supplies onboard. In 
> addition, Williams swapped power supplies on one of the station's 
> laptop computers, completed some modifications on the umbilical 
> interface assembly in the Quest airlock, and configured and trained 
> on the station's Robotic Onboard Trainer. She also worked in the 
> Minus Eighty Degree Laboratory Freezer for the International Space 
> Station, or MELFI, replacing the desiccant, a material that absorbs 
> moisture, in Dewar 4, and checked to make sure the nitrogen pressure 
> was within acceptable range.
>
> For more about the crew's activities and station sighting 
> opportunities, visit: 
>
> http://www.nasa.gov/station 
>
> 	
> -end-
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