ISS On-Orbit Status 6 Apr 2003
All ISS systems continue to function nominally, except as noted previously or below. Ahead: Week 19 for Expedition 6.
Sunday and off-duty day (but certainly not do-nothing day) for the crew, with a remarkably full schedule.
First thing after breakfast at 2:40am EDT, FE-1 Nikolai Budarin took care of his daily checkup of the BIO-5 “Rasteniya-2/Lada-2” zero-G plant growth experiment.
Later, Budarin completed the weekly routine tasks of collecting SP toilet flush counter and SVO water supply readings in the Service Module (SM) for calldown to TsUP, followed by the regular inspection of the Elektron oxygen generator’s VM gas/liquid system for the air bubble that may linger after IFMs (in-flight maintenances).
Nikolai also conducted the weekly inspection of the BRPK air/condensate separator of the SRVK condensate water processing system and performed the daily routine maintenance of the SOZh life support system (including ASU toilet facilities), while FE-2/SO Donald Pettit readied the IMS inventory system for the daily automated export/import of updates.
CDR Kenneth Bowersox and Pettit were scheduled to work on the Canadian SSRMS (space station remote manipulator system) in preparation for the EVA next Tuesday. [After configuring video cameras and RWS (robotic workstation) display overlays as required, they were to maneuver the arm from the current “Kurs” survey position to the EVA support viewing position to provide situational awareness during the spacewalk. The various views will be supplied by several cameras on Canadarm2.]
Shortly before dinner time (3:30pm EDT), Budarin will set up the “Urolux” equipment for another session with the Russian biochemical urine test (PZE MO-9) on his timeline for tomorrow. [Assessments MO-7 (calf volume measurement) and MO-8 (body mass measurement, BMM) are also planned for tomorrow morning.]
Setup and installation of the EarthKAM equipment in the Lab has been put on Bowersox’s and Pettit’s “job jar” task list, with a due date of Wednesday, 4/9. [Originally concerned about the SSRMS blocking the view from the Lab module’s science window, possibly necessitating a move of EarthKAM to the SM, the ground now expects to get all the EarthKAM images needed after the arm moves out of their field-of-view on Wednesday.]
On the occasion of the upcoming Cosmonautics Day on 4/12 (next Saturday), the crew downlinked additional salutary messages to Moscow. [The first addresses the participants of the International Youth Conference “We are the Children of the Galaxy” ending 4/10 at the Moscow Youth Palace. With the purpose of educating the youth (high-school students and members of aerospace clubs) on the “history of the Russian space exploration odyssey” and “boost their interest towards the future of space science”, the Moscow-Government-organized program involves thousands of young Muscovites visiting Star City with GCTC, Korolev with MCC-M (TsUP) and RSC-Energia in Korolev, and the Tsiolkovskiy Museum in Kaluga. Today’s interchange between the ISS crew and a group of high school kids will be played back at the closing ceremonies on 4/10. The second greeting salutes the participants of the 29th “Gagarin Lectures” International Youth Scientific Conference, a traditional annual event commemorating the first human’s flight into space.]
Today’s nighttime targets for the Diatomeya ocean observation program, on the Russian task list, were in the Pacific Ocean (visual only, no imaging), viz.: the dynamic waters of the Kuroshio Current and highly bioproductive coral islands of the Caroline archipelago and Solomon Islands.
For the Uragan (“hurricane”) earth observation program, Budarin today again focused on cities of Northern Iraq, a perspective panoramic shot of the Caucasus range, and dust storms of the Aral Sea. [Stated purpose of imaging Iraq is to record the effects of the ecological disaster resulting from the combustion of petroleum products.]
Last night, the IAC (internal audio controller) system transitioned from IAC-2 to IAC-1 and back to IAC-2 after a few minutes. [The ground is still looking into why these transitions occur ever so often and have dumped data from IAC-1 to help explain them. Last occurrence was on 12/6/2002. Currently, it is believed that IAC-1 is healthy and that the crew has a fully redundant IAC system.]
All crewmembers performed their regular daily physical exercise regimen (2.5 hrs.) on RED resistive exerciser, TVIS treadmill, and VELO ergometer with load trainer.
The station residents also had their regular weekly PFCs (private family conferences), Bowersox and Pettit via S-band/audio, Budarin via IP home phone, with TV/Ku-band as backup).
Today’s CEO (crew earth observations) targets, with the current LVLH attitude now including near-vertical views from the city target list, were Chongqing (Chungking), China (one of the two very large cities in China’s largest province, Sichuan. One hundred million people live in the “Red Basin” of this province, an almost circular depression surrounded by low mountains), Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (looking a touch left for this hard-to-see highland city. ESC [electronic still camera] camera), S Chad wetlands (Dynamic event. Sunglint opportunity [near nadir] for detailed documentation of complex river patterns in a vast, remote wetland. Study of certain wetland river patterns is part of a global geological study of river sedimentation), Western Mediterranean Smog (possible smog mass moving down the Rhone valley into the Mediterranean basin. Looking right to shoot plumes against the sea surface), Barcelona, Spain (nadir pass over this port city. ESC camera), Sabancaya landslide site, Peru (shooting a series of detailed images to capture this study site of a potential hillslope collapse hazard), and High Central Andean Glaciers (hundreds of volcanoes exist in the central Andes Mountains. Crew was to shoot any near-nadir volcano-summit ice fields. Tropical ice fields are generally melting quickly).
CEO images can be viewed at the websites
http://eol.jsc.nasa.gov and
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov
