International Space Station Status Report #03-60
2 p.m. CST Friday, November 21, 2003
Expedition 8 Crew

The eighth permanent crew to live on the International Space Station
completed its first month aboard the complex this week, a week that saw the
16 nations that participate in the Station program celebrate the fifth
anniversary of its launch.

The first Station component, the control module Zarya, was launched from the
Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan on Nov. 20, 1998. Thirty-six launches later,
the Station now has a mass of more than 412,000 pounds and a interior volume
of 15,000 cubic feet, as large as a three-bedroom house. More than 100
different space travelers from five space agencies and nine countries have
visited the complex.

To assist planners as they evaluate a potential spacewalk early next year,
Expedition 8 Commander Mike Foale and Flight Engineer Alexander Kaleri spent
the first part of this week working with Russian Orlan spacesuits. They
evaluated how to get into the Soyuz spacecraft docked to the Station's Pirs
compartment while wearing the bulky suits. Such a procedure could be
necessary if they were unable to repressurize Pirs, which is used as an
airlock to begin and end Russian spacewalks, and had to board the Soyuz.

The potential February spacewalk would exchange samples in exterior
experiments and prepare an aft Station docking port for the European Space
Agency's Automated Transport Vehicle, a new, uncrewed station cargo vehicle
targeted for launch late next year.

In anticipation of the crew's first use of the Station's Canadarm2 robotic
arm, Foale spent time Friday going through a computer-guided refresher on
arm operations. Their first use of the arm, a training session, is planned
for early next week.

On Friday, Foale completed alterations to an instrumented suit for use in
next week's work with the Foot/Ground Reaction Forces During Spaceflight
(FOOT) experiment. The Lower Extremity Monitoring Suit (LEMS), a customized
pair of Lycra cycling shorts outfitted with 20 sensors, will measure forces
on Foale's feet and joints and gauge his muscle activity while completing
his normal activities in the Station. The experiment's researchers hope to
learn more about the reasons for bone and muscle loss by astronauts in
orbit, insight that may lead to better countermeasures for astronauts.

Engineers are analyzing the effects of a possible gyroscope failure in the
Station treadmill's vibration isolation system. The analysis began after the
crew reported hearing unusual noises from that system. While the analysis is
under way, the crew has been asked not to use the treadmill and instead to
use a stationary bicycle and other exercise equipment.

The Expedition 7 crewmembers returned to Houston this week after more than
three weeks of medical checkups and debriefings with Russian specialists.
Commander Yuri Malenchenko and NASA ISS Science Officer Ed Lu, who completed
a 185-day spaceflight with a landing in Kazakhstan in a Soyuz spacecraft on
Oct. 27, will continue their postflight operations with checkups and
debriefings at the Johnson Space Center.

Information on the crew's activities aboard the Space Station, future launch
dates, as well as Station sighting opportunities from anywhere on the Earth,
is available on the Internet at:

http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/

Details on Station science operations can be found on an Internet site
administered by the Payload Operations Center at NASA's Marshall Space
Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., at:

http://scipoc.msfc.nasa.gov/

The next ISS status report will be issued Nov. 28, or sooner if events
warrant.

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Jacques :-)

Editor: www.spacepatches.info