Tue, Nov 15, 2011
Docking With ISS Planned For Tuesday
NASA astronaut Dan Burbank and Russian cosmonauts Anton
Shkaplerov and Anatoly Ivanishin launched to the International
Space Station at 2314 EST Sunday from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in
Kazakhstan. The launch had been delayed following the loss of a
Russian Progress cargo vessel in August.
NASA File Photo
Burbank, Shkaplerov and Ivanishin are scheduled to dock their
Soyuz TMA-22 spacecraft with their new home at 2333 EST Tuesday,
November 15, and join Expedition 29 Commander Mike Fossum of NASA
and Flight Engineers Satoshi Furukawa of the Japan Aerospace
Exploration Agency and Russian cosmonaut Sergei Volkov. Fossum will
hand over command of the station to the new crew within four
days.
Fossum, Furukawa and Volkov launched in June and are scheduled
to return to Earth in their Soyuz TMA-02M spacecraft at 2024 EST
November 21 Expedition 30 begins when the current crew undocks,
leaving Burbank in command. A formal change of command ceremony is
planned for November 20.
NASA astronaut Don Pettit, Russian cosmonaut Oleg Kononenko and
European Space Agency astronaut Andre Kuipers are scheduled to
launch to the station December 21, when they will join Expedition
30 as flight engineers. The six crew members will be busy with
dozens of experiments during their time aboard the station. They
also will welcome a new era of commercial resupply services from
the United States. Expedition 30 is expected to greet the arrival
of Dragon, a commercial resupply ship being built by SpaceX of
Hawthorne, CA. Dragon will perform a test flight and rendezvous
with the station, soon followed by Cygnus (scheduled for flight
during Expedition 31), another commercial resupply ship being built
by Orbital Sciences Corporation of Dulles, VA.
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