NASA Space Station On-Orbit Status 22 February 2017 – Dragon Set to be Captured
NASA and SpaceX flight controllers in Houston and Hawthorne, California are reworking plans for the arrival Thursday of the SpaceX Dragon cargo craft after its rendezvous to the International Space Station was aborted early Wednesday morning. The Dragon’s computers received an incorrect navigational update, triggering an automatic wave off.
Dragon was sent on a “racetrack” trajectory in front of, above and behind the station for a second rendezvous attempt Thursday. Dragon is in excellent shape and neither the crew nor the station were in any danger. NASA TV will cover its second rendezvous attempt Thursday beginning at 4 a.m. EST.
Expedition 50 commander Shane Kimbrough and Thomas Pesquet will be back in the cupola Thursday waiting to capture Dragon at around 6 a.m. Flight Engineer Peggy Whitson will be assisting the duo monitoring Dragon’s arrival and its systems.
A few hours before Dragon aborted its rendezvous, Russia launched its Progress 66 (66P) resupply ship from Kazakhstan on a two-day trip to the station’s Pirs docking compartment. The 66P is carrying nearly three tons of food, fuel and supplies to the six-member Expedition 50 crew. It will arrive Friday for an automated docking at 3:34 a.m. and stay at the station until June. NASA TV will also cover its arrival starting at 2:45 a.m.
On-Orbit Status Report
66 Progress (66P) Launch: 66P launched successfully from Baikonur, Kazakhstan on Tuesday at 11:23 pm CST with nominal ascent. Docking is scheduled for Friday, February 24th at 2:36 am CST.
SpaceX (SpX)-10 Capture: This morning’s rendezvous was aborted as a result of a bad ISS state vector being uplinked to the Dragon vehicle. The SpaceX team is in the process of analyzing the cause of this bad state vector and how to prevent this in the future. The ISS and SpaceX teams are preparing to perform a re-rendezvous tomorrow, February 23rd. Capture is tentatively planned for 11:00 GMT (5:00 am CST).
Crew Day: As a result of the aborted SpX-10 capture, ground teams have elected to make today an off-duty day for the USOS crew. As part of their off duty time today the crew performed their routine weekend housekeeping activities, since Saturday will now be a crew work day.
Fluids Integrated Rack (FIR) White Light Cable Swap: The crew performed a swap of the White Light Fiber Optic (F/O) moving the cable from one light source to the other. The light from the FIR White Light Lamps is transmitted through the cables to the Light Microscopy Module (LMM) microscope to provide lighting to the experiment sample. LMM Biophysics 1 (The Effect of Macromolecular Transport of Microgravity Protein Crystallization) launched on SpX-10. When installed, investigators will use the results from LMM Biophysics 1 to examine the movement of single protein molecules in microgravity. By studying the crystals of a higher quality that can be grown in microgravity, scientists will be able to better understand their structure and how they work.
Today’s Planned Activities
All activities were completed unless otherwise noted.
Crew Off Duty [Replanned]
Completed Task List Items
Wanted Poster for Minature Exercise Device Power Cable [Item not found]
Ground Activities
All activities were completed unless otherwise noted.
Configure for Dragon capture
Return to nominal configuration
Three-Day Look Ahead: [Note: replan of the next couple of days is in work]
Thursday, 02/23: Dragon capture and berthing, Dragon/N2 Vestibule outfitting, Node 2 CPA Removal, Dragon Ingress, Dragon Center Stack transfer, Double Cold Bag unpack
Friday, 02/24: 66P Dock, 66P ingress, 66P transfer operations, SABLE CO2 Incubator Install, TangoLab-1 card replace, MERLIN3 install, Polar 1 transfer and install, Glacier 3 transfer and install, MESC first microscope ops,
Saturday, 02/25: RR-4 transfer
QUICK ISS Status – Environmental Control Group:
Component – Status
Elektron – On
Vozdukh – Manual
[???] 1 – SM Air Conditioner System (“SKV1”) – Off
[???] 2 – SM Air Conditioner System (“SKV2”) – On
Carbon Dioxide Removal Assembly (CDRA) Lab – Standby – Carbon Dioxide Removal Assembly (CDRA) Node 3
Operate – Major Constituent Analyzer (MCA) Lab – Operate
Major Constituent Analyzer (MCA) Node 3 – Standby
Oxygen Generation Assembly (OGA) – Process
Urine Processing Assembly (UPA) – Standby
Trace Contaminant Control System (TCCS) Lab – Off
Trace Contaminant Control System (TCCS) Node 3 – Full Up
