International Space Station Status Report #39 - 2003

International Space Station Status Report #03-39
2 p.m. CDT, Friday, Aug. 22, 2003
Expedition 7 Crew

Aboard the International Space Station, Expedition 7 Commander Yuri
Malenchenko and NASA Science Officer Ed Lu studied their first sample in an
experiment designed to look at how air bubbles can weaken metals, crystals
and other materials as they coalesce on orbit. They also packed a resupply
craft full of trash and readied it for departure next week.

Today marked the crew's 118th day on orbit. Sample processing for the Pore
Formation and Mobility Investigation (PFMI) concluded today after beginning
Wednesday inside the U.S. laboratory Destiny and the protective environment
of the Microgravity Science Glovebox. Processing of the first Expedition 7
sample had been postponed from the previous week due to a missing data
cable. Lu found the cable after he talked with former Station Science
Officer Don Pettit via cell phone. Plans call for Lu to process seven more
samples.

Malenchenko participated in his fifth session with a Russian heart
experiment, Study of the Bioelectric Activity of the Heart at Rest, with Lu
assisting as crew medical officer and administering the electrocardiogram.
Lu also performed periodic health tests with a portable clinical blood
analyzer.

"The crew is in great spirits and looking forward to a busy week of
departures and arrivals next week," said Expedition 7 Lead Flight Director
John McCullough.

As the crew exhausted the supply of oxygen from the Progress 10 cargo
vehicle docked to the back of the Zvezda Service Module to repressurize the
Station, they continued filling it with trash and worn-out equipment. The
old Progress is scheduled to undock from Zvezda at 5:43 p.m. CDT Aug. 27,
and later will be commanded to re-enter and burn up in the Earth's
atmosphere. That undocking will vacate a port for the Progress 12 vehicle
that is scheduled to launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at
8:48p.m. CDT Aug. 28, and dock to Zvezda at 10:43p.m. CDT Aug. 30. Progress
12 will deliver about 1,000 pounds of food, supplies and equipment for use
on the Station.

Early next month, the Progress 11 resupply craft will depart its Pirs
docking compartment moorings to make room for the Soyuz TMA-3 spacecraft
that will ferry the Expedition 8 crew and European Space Agency astronaut
Pedro Duque of Spain to the Station on Oct. 20. Expedition 8 Commander
Michael Foale and Russian cosmonaut Alexander Kaleri will replace the
Expedition 7 crew, which will return to Earth Oct. 28 with Duque after he
completes more than a week of science activities.

Information on the crew's continuing activities on the Space Station, future
launch dates and Station sighting opportunities from anywhere on Earth is
available 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 following the Progress 10
undocking Aug. 27, or sooner if events warrant.



###






--
----

Jacques :-)

Editor: www.spacepatches.info

------------------------------------------------------