ISS On-Orbit Status 3 May 2002
All ISS systems continue to function nominally, except as noted
previously or below. Day 547 of continuous station
occupancy.
The crew was commended by the ground on yesterday’s great performance
in moving the SSRMS robot arm, handling the free drift action during
the Soyuz pre-separation jet fire tests, recovering the Elektron
oxygen generator’s prime string, varied science, and some fine public
events work. For their reward, they "get to work hard for
another day" today.
The visiting crew (VC) again made the most of their remaining time
again, with a schedule crammed with payload activities for the
Italian Marco Polo program, the South African suite of experiments
and Russian Soyuz 4S payloads, as well as for their numerous public
events.
SFP Mark Shuttleworth completed two life interactive TV interviews
with South African media, one at 2:55 am EDT with CNN, and one at
4:30 am for the TV program "Carte Blanche". At 1:50
pm, he also held an amateur radio session with students of
Khayelitsha, a large, predominantly informal settlement located some
30 km from the center of Cape Town, at Khayelitsha’s Solomon Mahlangu
Recreation Center.
VC FE-1 Roberto Vittori used suitable overflight passes for photo and
video imagery of Italy. He also held several telephone
conferences via IP phone, with Italian Senate President Pera, Radio
24 of the Italian radio and television4anization RAI, and others,
and he conducted a ham radio chat with the school of the city of
Castello.
CDR Yuri Onufrienko deinstalled the Russian experiment Skorpio
(scorpion) for return to Earth. Skorpio’s objective was to monitor
environmental parameters inside station compartments at various
places and to characterize environmental conditions for conducting
scientific and technical experiments. Skorpio required about 6
W of energy and was supported by imagery.
The U.S. CDRA (carbon dioxide removal system) was successfully
restarted and is operating nominally.
The ground was unable to retrieve the 8A CEVIS (cycle ergometer) EVA
pre-breathe exercise files from the MEC (medical equipment computer)
and requested the crew to transfer them to the MEC again during
normal exercise file download activity today.
The crew had downlinked excellent photos of the TVIS SLDs
(treadmill-subject load devices) and was commended for them and the
subsequent detailed inspection. The SLDs were verified to be
still in good condition for exercise. The cables are good to be
used until at least one major strand is broken/frayed (7 total
strands in cable, 19 wires per strand). The ground cannot
provide a prediction on how soon/long this will be, though it is
thought that the cables should last quite a while longer.
Replacement SLDs are to be launched on ULF-1, and there are no
spares available to fly in the near term.
FE-1 Carl Walz performed a Payload Film Test, to evaluate the
degradation of holographic film from long-term radiation exposure
onboard the ISS. The holographic film tested is a black and
white, high resolution negative film that may be used in future
payload operations.
Walz then inspected the ARIS (active rack isolation system) to
determine if the upper left actuator (#7), which he had removed, is
still usable.
He later activated the BTR (biotechnology refrigerator) for the
ground to determine its cooling capability for possible stowage of
BPS samples.
The BPS (biomass production system) ground team is continuing to
monitor and issue commands to restore prime to BPS systems.
Currently there are indications that air is still present and
is affecting the NDS systems of chambers 2 and 4. Consequently,
FE-2 Dan Bursch, in addition to the root module chamber 1 priming
scheduled for today, was asked to perform steps on the chamber 2 and
4 root modules to remove air from them and repeating the priming
operations for HCS (humidity control system), transfer pump and
NDS.
