Status Report

NASA Space Station On-Orbit Status 1 August 2004

By SpaceRef Editor
August 2, 2004
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NASA Space Station On-Orbit Status 1 August 2004

SpaceRef note: This NASA Headquarters internal status report, as presented here, contains additional, original material produced by SpaceRef.com (copyright © 2004) to enhance access to related status reports and NASA activities.

All ISS systems continue to function nominally except those noted previously or below.   Sunday — rest day aboard the ISS.  Ahead: Week 14 for Expedition 9.

Wakeup today was at 2:00am EDT.  Sleep cycle will be adjusted for the EVA-10 spacewalk tomorrow night as follows: Wakeup tomorrow morning — 2:30am for a short day, with sleep at 9:00am.  Second wakeup — 5:30pm tomorrow evening, for a very long working day, ending with bunk time at 3:00pm on Tuesday, 8/3.

Gennady Padalka completed the daily routine inspection of the SM’s SOZh life support system, including the periodic inspection of the BRPK air/liquid condensate separator apparatus.

Previous Reports

ISS On-orbit Status [HQ]
ISS Status [JSC]
Shuttle Processing [KSC]

At ~8:10am EDT, the crew has an hour reserved for an in-depth review of the EVA-10 timeline, including a tagup with TsUP ground specialists.   [Hatch closure between SM PkhO (Service Module Transfer Compartment) and DC1 (“Pirs” Docking Compartment) is set for Tuesday morning (8/3) at  ~1:30am, followed by Orlan ingress (1:40am) and start of 30-min prebreathe at ~2:22am.  DC1 will then be depressurized, first to 15 mmHg (Torr) for subsequent leak checking, then to full vacuum and EV 1 hatch opening at ~3:14am.  The spacewalk is expected to last until hatch closing at ~8:56am.  DC1 will then be repressed with air from the SM atmosphere, first to 260 mmHg for leak checks, then final repress.  Orlan-M suits will be doffed at ~9:27am and hatch to SM opened at ~9:45am.]

Mike and Gennady are also scheduled to perform their full regimen of physical exercise on VELO with force loader, RED (resistive exercise device) and TVIS (treadmill with vibration isolation and stabilization).

Working off the Russian discretionary task list, the CDR will conduct another session of the “Diatomeya” ocean observations program, using the DSR PD-150P camcorder and Nikon F5 digital still camera with 24/85-mm lens for Gennady to collect photo and video data on North Atlantic water areas that are characterized by highly seasonal dynamics of bio-production processes.   [The CDR is to collect data from the Northern Atlantic in the area of the sub polar oceanic front.]


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Later tonight, Gennady is scheduled to terminate the current run of the Molniya-SM/LSO (GFI-10) geophysical experiment started on 7/25, by first deactivating the two French computers EGE 1 and EGE 2, the LSO 06 instrument and the Russian RBS power outlet, then disassembling the equipment and stowing it.   [Molniya-SM/LSO automatically records storm phenomena and other related events in the Earth’s equatorial regions.  The experiment is controlled from the EGE-1 laptop, loaded with orbital sighting predictions using an up-to-date NORAD tracking TLE (two-line element) provided by NASA.  Objective of LSO was to study rare optical phenomena occurring in the upper layers of Earth’s atmosphere, so-called “sprites” (i.e., puzzling glow phenomena observed above thunderstorm clouds).  LSO was originally part of Claudie Haigneré’s French “Andromeda” payload package of taxi mission 3S that could not be performed as planned during Increment 4 due to an ISS flight attitude conflict.]

As a long-term recurring item on the Russian task list, Gennady is again charged today with taking photographs of the PKZ-1V Kromka experiment tablet deployed on the plume deflector of the SM’s plus-pitch thrusters. (Last time done: 6/27)   [The pictures are taken with the Kodak 760 digital still camera (DSC) from the EVA hatch #1 in the DC-1 docking compartment.]

Also working from the task list, Padalka will use the Nikon D1 (800mm-lens) to take areal photography for Russia’s Environmental Safety Agency (ECON) of an oil spill in the Eisk area and flooding of agricultural lands in the Volgograd, Akhtubinsk area.

The station continues to fly in LVLH XVV attitude (local vertical/local horizontal — X-axis in velocity vector, i.e. bow forward), until shortly before the EVA-10 on 8/3.

Major upcoming events:

  • OpsLan reconfig, etc. — 8/2;
  • Orlan EVA-10 from DC-1 — 8/3 (hatch open: 2:50am EDT);
  • EVA debrief, etc. — 8/4;
  • Progress 15P launch — 8/11 (1:01am EDT);
  • Progress 15P docking — 8/14 (2:05am EDT).

Expedition 9 Flight Crew Plans can be found at http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/station/timelines/

Previous NASA ISS On-orbit Status Reports can be found here. Previous NASA Space Station Status Reports can be found here. Previous NASA Space Shuttle Processing Status Reports can be found here. A collection of all of these reports and other materials relating to Return to Flight for the Space Shuttle fleet can be found here.

Today’s optional CEO photo targets, in the current LVLH attitude no longer limited by flight rule constraints on the use of the Lab nadir/science window, except for the shutter closure and condensation-prevention plan (limited to 90 min. in 24 hours), were Kuwait City, Kuwait (looking right ~1.5 degrees.  Then the gulf cities trended away from track), Aswan Dam, Nile valley, Egypt (nadir pass), Mogadishu, Somalia (a DMSP satellite image of the planet at night shows this to be the only light source in hundreds of miles of coastline), and Aurora Australis, Australia (looking right).

CEO images can be viewed at these websites:

See also the website “Space Station Challenge” at:

To view the latest photos taken by the expedition 9 crew visit:

ISS Altitude History

Apogee height Mean AltitudePerigee height

ISS Altitude History

For more on ISS orbit and worldwide ISS naked-eye visibility dates/times, see http://www.hq.nasa.gov/osf/station/viewing/issvis.html. In addition, information on International Space Station sighting opportunities can be found at http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/realdata/sightings/ on NASA’s Human Spaceflight website. The current location of the International Space Station can be found at http://science.nasa.gov/temp/StationLoc.html at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center. Additional satellite tracking resources can be found at http://www.spaceref.com/iss/tracking.html.

SpaceRef staff editor.