NASA Administrator Meets With Japanese Prime Minister

Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda, fourth from left, accepts a montage from NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, third from left, during a meeting at the Blair House as Associate Administrator for Science and former astronaut John Grunsfeld, left, Associate Administrator for Education and former astronaut Leland Melvin, second from left, and JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) astronauts Koichi Wakata and Satoshi Furukawa, right, look on, Monday, April 30, 2012, in Washington.

Image Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls

Expedition 29 Crew Lands

Russian support personnel work to help get crew members out of the Soyuz TMA-02M spacecraft shortly after the capsule landed with Expedition 29 Commander Mike Fossum and flight engineers Sergei Volkov and Satoshi Furukawa in a remote area outside of the town of Arkalyk, Kazakhstan, at 9:26 p.m. EST on Monday, Nov. 21, 2011 (8:26 a.m. Tuesday, Nov. 22, 2011, Kazakhstan time). NASA astronaut Fossum, Russian cosmonaut Volkov and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Furukawa are returning from more than five months aboard the International Space Station where they served as members of the Expedition 28 and 29 crews.
 
Image Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls

Space Station Trio Lands Safely in Kazakhstan

Michael Curie
Headquarters, Washington

Kelly Humphries

Johnson Space Center, Houston

HOUSTON -- Three International Space Station crew members safely returned to Earth on Monday, wrapping up nearly six months in space during which NASA and its international partners celebrated the 11th anniversary of continuous residence and work aboard the station.

Expedition 29 Commander Mike Fossum, Flight Engineers Satoshi Furukawa of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency and Sergei Volkov of the Russian Federal Space Agency landed their Soyuz spacecraft in frigid conditions on the central steppe of Kazakhstan at 8:26 p.m. CST Nov. 21 (8:26 a.m. Kazakhstan time, Nov. 22). The trio arrived at the station on June 9. They spent 167 days in space and 165 days on the complex. Volkov, a two-time station crew member, now has accumulated 366 days in space.

Before leaving the station, Fossum handed over command to NASA's Dan Burbank, who leads Expedition 30. Burbank and Flight Engineers Anatoly Ivanishin and Anton Shkaplerov of Russia will continue research and maintenance aboard the station.

The remaining Expedition 30 crew members, NASA astronaut Don Pettit, European Space Agency astronaut Andre Kuipers, and cosmonaut Oleg Kononenko, are scheduled to launch Dec. 21 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome and dock with the station on Dec. 23.

To follow Twitter updates from Burbank, visit http://twitter.com/AstroCoastie.

To view social media updates from Fossum's mission, visit http://twitter.com/astro_aggie and http://go.nasa.gov/oZgHtl.

For more information about Expedition 29 and the space station, visit http://www.nasa.gov/station.

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Seattle Students Chat With Space Station Astronauts On Monday

Ann Marie Trotta

Headquarters, Washington

 

Rachel Kraft

Johnson Space Center, Houston

WASHINGTON -- Students gathered at the Museum of Flight in Seattle will make a long distance call to astronauts aboard the International Space Station at approximately 1:35 p.m. EDT on Monday, Aug. 29.

Students from Aviation High School, Puyallup High School, Civil Air Patrol and Liberty High School will ask Expedition 28 Flight Engineers Ron Garan, Mike Fossum and Satoshi Furukawa questions about life, work and research in space. The event will include a video link with the three astronauts and will be broadcast live on NASA Television.

To attend the event, reporters must contact Mike Bush at the museum at mbush@museumofflight.org 253-307-3225.

The museum offers a variety of education activities that explore science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) and the space program. It also hosts the Washington Aerospace Scholars program, a hands-on, STEM-focused initiative for high school juniors based on NASA's Texas Aerospace Scholars program.

This in-flight education downlink is one in a series with educational organizations in the United States and abroad to improve STEM teaching and learning. It is an integral component of NASA's Teaching From Space education program, which promotes learning opportunities and builds partnerships with the education community using the unique environment of space and NASA's human spaceflight program.

The exact time of the downlink could change. For the latest NASA TV schedule, visit http://www.nasa.gov/ntv.

For information about NASA's education programs, visit http://www.nasa.gov/education.

For information about the International Space Station, visit http://www.nasa.gov/station.

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NASA Television To Air Space Station Cargo Ship Arrival

Michael Curie

Headquarters, Washington

 

Kelly Humphries

Johnson Space Center, Houston

HOUSTON -- NASA Television will provide live coverage as a Russian Progress cargo spacecraft arrives at the International Space Station at 9:38 a.m. CDT on Friday, Aug. 26.

NASA TV coverage will begin at 9 a.m., in lieu of the day's "ISS Update" program. The unpiloted Progress 44 spacecraft will automatically dock to the rear port of the station's Zvezda service module.

The cargo ship will carry three tons of food, fuel and other supplies for the six crew members, Expedition 28 Commander Andrey Borisenko and Flight Engineers Ron Garan, Mike Fossum, Satoshi Furukawa, Alexander Samokutyaev and Sergei Volkov.

It will be launched at 8 a.m. (7 p.m. Baikonur time) on Wednesday, Aug. 24, from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. NASA TV will not air the launch live, but will show replays during the regularly scheduled 10 a.m. "ISS Update" program.

For NASA TV downlink, schedule and streaming video information, visit http://www.nasa.gov/ntv.

For information about the International Space Station, visit http://www.nasa.gov/station.

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Mississippi And Louisiana Students To Call Space Station Astronauts

Ann Marie Trotta

Headquarters, Washington

 

Rebecca Strecker

Stennis Space Center, Miss.

WASHINGTON -- Students gathered at NASA's John C. Stennis Space Center in Mississippi will place a long distance call to astronauts aboard the International Space Station at 1:35 p.m. EDT on Thursday, Aug. 18.

Mississippi and Louisiana students in kindergarten through twelfth grade will ask Expedition 28 Flight Engineers Ron Garan, Mike Fossum and Satoshi Furukawa questions related to mass and weight. The experience is designed to enhance the students' understanding of scientific principles, physics and space. Stennis' education office is hosting the call, which will include a video link with the three astronauts and will be broadcast live on NASA Television.

To attend, journalists must contact Rebecca Strecker at 228-688-3249 no later than 3 p.m. on Wednesday, Aug. 17, to arrange for clearance and escort to the event.

This in-flight education downlink is one in a series with educational organizations in the United States and abroad to improve teaching and learning in science, technology, engineering and mathematics studies. It is an integral component of NASA's Teaching From Space education program, which promotes learning opportunities and builds partnerships with the education community using the unique environment of space and NASA's human spaceflight program.

The exact time of the downlink could change. For the latest NASA TV schedule, visit http://www.nasa.gov/ntv.

For information about NASA's education programs, visit http://www.nasa.gov/education.

For more information about the International Space Station, visit http://www.nasa.gov/station.

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Mississippi And Louisiana Students To Call Space Station Astronauts

Ann Marie Trotta

Headquarters, Washington

 

Rebecca Strecker

Stennis Space Center, Miss.

WASHINGTON -- Students gathered at NASA's John C. Stennis Space Center in Mississippi will place a long distance call to astronauts aboard the International Space Station at 1:35 p.m. EDT on Thursday, Aug. 18.

Mississippi and Louisiana students in kindergarten through twelfth grade will ask Expedition 28 Flight Engineers Ron Garan, Mike Fossum and Satoshi Furukawa questions related to mass and weight. The experience is designed to enhance the students' understanding of scientific principles, physics and space. Stennis' education office is hosting the call, which will include a video link with the three astronauts and will be broadcast live on NASA Television.

To attend, journalists must contact Rebecca Strecker at 228-688-3249 no later than 3 p.m. on Wednesday, Aug. 17, to arrange for clearance and escort to the event.

This in-flight education downlink is one in a series with educational organizations in the United States and abroad to improve teaching and learning in science, technology, engineering and mathematics studies. It is an integral component of NASA's Teaching From Space education program, which promotes learning opportunities and builds partnerships with the education community using the unique environment of space and NASA's human spaceflight program.

The exact time of the downlink could change. For the latest NASA TV schedule, visit http://www.nasa.gov/ntv.

For information about NASA's education programs, visit http://www.nasa.gov/education.

For more information about the International Space Station, visit http://www.nasa.gov/station.

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STS-135 Arrives, Crew Begins Work at Station

Space shuttle Atlantis docked with the International Space Station at 11:07 a.m. EDT Sunday with a cargo-carrying module in its payload bay filled with equipment and supplies for the orbiting laboratory. Hatches separating crews were opened at 12:47 p.m. Shuttle crew members, Commander Chris Ferguson, Pilot Doug Hurley and Mission Specialists Sandra Magnus and Rex Walheim, entered the station moments later to begin their week-plus stay.

Ferguson and Hurley used the shuttle arm to take its 50-foot extension boom from the station’s Canadarm2 operated by station Flight Engineers Ron Garan and Satoshi Furukawa. The station arm had plucked the boom from its stowage position on the shuttle cargo bay sill. The handoff was to prepare to use the boom for any needed shuttle heat shield inspection later this week. Magnus worked with TV setup and Walheim transferred spacewalk gear.

Docking had gone just as planned. Ferguson and the crew of space shuttle Atlantis began their final approach to the station from about eight miles distance with the terminal initiation burn at 8:29 a.m.

About 600 feet below the station, Atlantis did a backflip to enable station crew members to photograph the shuttle’s heat shield. The photos were sent to mission control to be evaluated by experts on the ground to look for any damage.

Flight controllers began monitoring reports from the Department of Defense’s U.S. Strategic Command that a piece of orbital debris may come near the station and shuttle complex about noon on Tuesday. The debris, part of satellite COSMOS 375, is one of more than 500,000 pieces of debris tracked in Earth’s orbit. The team expected updated tracking information following today’s docking to help determine if a maneuver using the shuttle’s thrusters is necessary to avoid the debris.

The crew sleep period is scheduled to begin at 6:59 p.m. Flight Day 4 begins with crew wake up at 2:59 a.m. Monday.

Atlantis Docks to International Space Station

At 11:07 a.m. EDT, Commander Chris Ferguson guided space shuttle Atlantis into pressurized mating adapter #2 on the International Space Station’s Harmony node. The two spacecraft were flying about 240 miles high, east of New Zealand, at the time they docked.

This was the 12th and final time Atlantis docked to the space station. It was the 46th shuttle docking to a space station, nine to the Russian Mir station and 37 to the International Space Station. Atlantis performed seven of the nine Mir dockings. This was the 86th space shuttle rendezvous operation and the 164th “proximity operation” in the history of the Space Shuttle Program, where a shuttle conducted operations in close proximity to another spacecraft.

The shuttle and station crews will open hatches and hold the traditional welcome ceremony at about 1:19 p.m. Atlantis’ crew of Ferguson, Pilot Doug Hurley, and Mission Specialists Sandy Magnus and Rex Walheim will join Expedition 28 Commander Andrey Borisenko and Flight Engineers Alexander Samokutyaev and Sergei Volkov of Russia, Satoshi Furukawa from Japan, and NASA’s Ron Garan and Mike Fossum.

The combined crew of 10 begins more than a week of docked operations, transferring vital supplies and equipment to sustain station operations once the shuttles are retired.

Today’s Mission Status Briefing is scheduled for 1:30 p.m. and the Mission Management Team Briefing is set for 4 p.m. Both will air live on NASA TV and http://www.nasa.gov/ntv.

Atlantis on Final Path to Station

Commander Chris Ferguson and the crew of space shuttle Atlantis performed the Terminal Initiation burn at 8:29 a.m. EDT, firing the left Orbital Maneuvering System engine for 12 seconds to place the shuttle on the final path for its 11:07 a.m. docking to the International Space Station, which is about eight miles away.

When Atlantis is about 600 feet from the station, Ferguson will guide the shuttle through a backflip rotation to expose the heat shield to station crew members who will snap high resolution digital photographs. Flight Engineers Sergei Volkov, Mike Fossum and Satoshi Furukawa will use cameras with 1,000 mm, 800 mm and 400 mm lenses, respectively, to photograph Atlantis’ upper and lower surfaces through windows in the Zvezda Service Module. The photos will be transmitted to Mission Control in Houston for evaluation by imagery experts and mission managers to determine whether the heat shield sustained any damage during launch.

Action Figure

Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Satoshi Furukawa may not be Superman, but in the microgravity of space, he can fly (well, almost). Actually, Furukawa is the flight engineer for Expedition 28 on the International Space Station.

As part of the planned duties for this mission, the station crew continue installing infrastructure upgrades to the station’s command and control computers and its communications systems. The station crew also assisted the STS-134 shuttle mission and continue preparations for the arrival of STS-135, the final mission of the Space Shuttle Program.

Image Credit: NASA

Lift Off

The Soyuz TMA-02M spacecraft launches from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan early Wednesday, June 8, 2011, (4:12 p.m. EDT, Tuesday, June 7) carrying Expedition 28 Soyuz Commander Sergei Volkov of Russia, NASA Flight Engineer Mike Fossum and JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) Flight Engineer Satoshi Furukawa to the International Space Station.

Image Credit: NASA/Carla Cioffi

New Space Station Crew Members Launch from Kazakhstan

Michael Curie

Headquarters, Washington                                        

 

Kelly Humphries

Johnson Space Center, Houston

HOUSTON -- NASA astronaut Mike Fossum, Russian cosmonaut Sergei Volkov and Japanese astronaut Satoshi Furukawa launched to the International Space Station at 3:12 p.m. CDT Tuesday (2:12 a.m. local time, Wednesday) from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

Fossum, Furukawa and Volkov - the Soyuz commander- are scheduled to dock their spacecraft with their new home at 4:22 p.m. Thursday, June 9. They will join Expedition 28 commander Andrey Borisenko and flight engineer Alexander Samokutyaev of the Russian space agency and Ron Garan of NASA. The trio has been aboard the station since April 6.

On Thursday, coverage of the Soyuz docking will begin on NASA Television at 3:30 p.m. NASA TV coverage of the hatches opening and the welcoming ceremony aboard the orbiting laboratory will begin at 8:30 p.m.

The six-person crew will continue the uninterrupted presence of humans on the station since Nov. 2, 2000, conducting expanded scientific research and station maintenance activities. The station residents also will welcome the crew of the last space shuttle flight, Atlantis' STS-135 mission, targeted to launch July 8. The shuttle will deliver critical supplies in the Italian-built Raffaello multi-purpose logistics module and support spacewalks by Fossum and Garan to retrieve a failed cooling system pump module, which Atlantis will return to Earth for analysis.

Garan, Borisenko and Samokutyaev, who launched to the station April 4, will return to Earth in September. Before departing, Borisenko will hand over command of the station to Fossum for Expedition 29, which begins when the Soyuz TMA-21 undocks.

NASA astronaut Dan Burbank and Russian cosmonauts Anton Shkaplerov and Anatoly Ivanishin will join Fossum, Volkov and Furukawa to complete the Expedition 29 crew in September.

Fossum will blog about his experiences while aboard the space station. His first blog entry will be posted later today at http://blogs.nasa.gov.

For NASA TV streaming video, schedule and downlink information, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/ntv.

For more information about Expedition 29 and the space station, visit http://www.nasa.gov/station.

To follow Twitter updates from Expedition 28-29 crew member Garan, visit http://twitter.com/Astro_Ron.

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In the Light of the Sun

The Soyuz TMA-02M spacecraft is seen at the launch pad after being raised into vertical position on Sunday, June 5, 2011, at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The launch of the Soyuz spacecraft with Expedition 28 Soyuz Commander Sergei Volkov of Russia, NASA Flight Engineer Mike Fossum and JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) Flight Engineer Satoshi Furukawa is scheduled for Tuesday, June 7, 2011.

Image Credit: NASA/Carla Cioffi

Expedition 28 Crew Departs Star City

Expedition 28 crew members--Flight Engineer Satoshi Furukawa, left, Soyuz commander Sergei Volkov, center, and Flight Engineer Mike Fossum--answer reporters' questions during a press conference held on the grounds of the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center, Wednesday, May 25, 2011 in Star City, Russia. The crew later departed for Baikonur, Kazakhstan, in preparation for their June launch to the International Space Station.

Image Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls

International Space Station Crew Holds News Conference

Stephanie Schierholz

Headquarters, Washington

 

Nicole Cloutier-Lemasters

Johnson Space Center, Houston

HOUSTON -- Three crew members launching in May to live and work aboard the International Space Station will hold a news conference at 1 p.m. CST on Monday, March 21, at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston. The briefing will be broadcast live on NASA Television and the agency's website. Questions will be taken from participating NASA centers.

NASA astronaut Mike Fossum, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Satoshi Furukawa and Russian cosmonaut Sergei Volkov will participate in individual round-robin interviews, in person or by phone, following the news conference. The crew also will participate in a photo opportunity for reporters at Johnson.

Media representatives planning to attend the briefing or participate in the round-robin interviews must contact the Johnson newsroom at 281-483-5111 by 5 p.m. on Friday, March 11. All of the required paperwork for international journalists must be submitted to the newsroom by March 11.

Fossum, Furukawa and Volkov are three of the six crew members who will comprise Expeditions 28 and 29. The trio is scheduled to launch to the station aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on May 30.

They will join Expedition 28 NASA astronaut Ron Garan, and Russian cosmonauts Alexander Samokutyaev and Andrey Borisenko, who will stay aboard the station until mid-September.

In early October, NASA's Dan Burbank, and Russia's Anton Shkaplerov and Anatoly Ivanishin, will join Fossum, Furukawa and Volkov to complete the Expedition 29 crew.

For astronaut and cosmonaut biographical information, visit http://www.jsc.nasa.gov/Bios.

For NASA TV streaming video, schedules and downlink information, visit http://www.nasa.gov/ntv.

For more information about the crew members and their mission, visit http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition28.

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