Space Station Crews Hold Press Conference From Orbit
The combined Expedition 6 and 7 crews held a joint press conference from orbit today with reporters in The U.S. and Russia.
The Expedition 6 crew will depart the ISS aboard the Soyuz TMA-1 (5S) spacecraft which has been docked to the ISS for the past 6 months. Prior to the Columbia accident and the grounding of the Shuttle fleet, the plan had been for the Expedition 6 crew to return to Earth aboard a Shuttle.
When asked if he had any concerns about returning in a Soyuz spacecraft (as opposed to the Space Shuttle) Expedition 6 astronaut Don Pettit replied “we’ve done a heap of training for Shuttle and Soyuz reentries – either one is fine with us. There is no extraordinary angst regarding any reentry where you have to get rid of the energy of orbit and land on the surface of the earth with zero velocity.”
Expedition 6 astronaut Ken Bowersox was asked if he had an concerns about landing in Kazakhstan. He replied that he had spent a lot of time looking down at Kazakhstan from orbit and that he was “excited about landing in Kazakhstan. I did a lot of training for this in Star City. I was thinking at the time that I am doing this training and I am never going to get to use it.” He added “It will be a very interesting life experience.”
Expedition 7 cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko added that landing in a Shuttle is like “landing in a commercial airplane” but that the Soyuz ride, with its higher G loads, rocket firings, and parachute landing on the ground was a little less comfortable.
When asked about his experiences aboard the ISS, Bowersox said “I am going to miss the station a lot. I kind of feel like I am being kicked out of my apartment for not paying rent.” Don Pettit added that he had two young boys who turned 2 during his mission and that they have now started to talk in sentences “I have never been with them when they have been talking.” He also added that he was “looking forward to some good home cooking.”
Expedition 7 astronaut Ed Lu was asked if he had any concerns about a two man crew aboard the ISS. He replied “we will be able to do just fine. Yuri lived on Mir for 3 months. We do not have Shuttle coming up to bring huge amount of supplies, so we will have to conserve a little bit.”
Don Pettit became quite the science teacher while in orbit. He as asked if he was going to continue this educational effort upon return to Earth. Pettit said that he was going to try and keep “Saturday Science” going when he gets back. “I’d like to convince the people that made this possible. I would like to continue doing that [as well as] the station science chronicles.
The Expedition 6 crew was on in orbit when Columbia was lost. When asked about how they’d face this upon return to Earth Bowersox said “it was hard for Don and I being away from it all – and [now] to be confronted with all that emotion [upon return].”
