ISS - Expedition 57 Mission patch.
December 3, 2018
NASA astronaut Anne McClain, David Saint-Jacques of the Canadian Space Agency, and Oleg Konenenko of the Russian space agency Roscosmos joined Expedition 57 Commander Alexander Gerst of ESA (European Space Agency), Serena Auñón-Chancellor of NASA, and Sergey Prokopyev of Roscosmos aboard the International Space Station when the hatches between the Soyuz spacecraft and the orbiting laboratory officially opened at 2:37 p.m. EST.
The arrival briefly restores the station’s crew complement to six until Auñón-Chancellor, Gerst and Prokopyev return to Earth Dec. 20. Expedition 58 officially begins once the three departing spacefarers undock from the space station.
Image above: The six-member Expedition 57 crew (from left) Serena Auñón-Chancellor, David Saint-Jacques, Alexander Gerst, Oleg Kononenko, Anne McClain and Sergey Prokopyev gather for a portrait. Image Credit: NASA TV.
McClain, Saint-Jacques and Konenenko will spend more than six months conducting hundreds of science investigations in fields such as biology, Earth science, human research, physical sciences and technology development, providing the foundation for continuing human spaceflight beyond low-Earth orbit to the Moon and Mars. Some of the investigations they will conduct are sponsored by the U.S. National Laboratory on the space station, which Congress designated in 2005 to maximize its use for improving quality of life on Earth. Highlights of upcoming investigations include experiments in forest observation, robotic refueling, and satellite deployment.
The crew is scheduled to be onboard during the first test flights of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, which will return human spaceflight launches to U.S. soil.
Soyuz MS-11 hatch opening
In March, the station will again return to a full complement of six crew members when they are joined for Expedition 59 by NASA astronauts Nick Hague and Christina Koch and Alexey Ovchinin of Roscosmos.
This is the first spaceflight for both McClain and Saint-Jacques and the fourth trip to the space station for Kononenko.
NASA Astronaut Nick Hague Set for New Space Station Mission
At the post-launch news conference for the Expedition 58 crew, Roscosmos and NASA officials announced that NASA astronaut Nick Hague and cosmonaut Alexey Ovchinin of Roscosmos, who were forced to abort their recent mission Oct. 11 to the International Space Station, are now scheduled to launch again Feb. 28, 2019, from the Baikonour Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
Hague, Ovchinin and NASA astronaut Christina Hammock Koch will launch aboard the Russian Soyuz MS-12 spacecraft and join NASA astronaut Anne McClain, David Saint-Jacques of the Canadian Space Agency, and Oleg Konenenko of Roscosmos as station’s Expedition 59 crew.
Image above: NASA astronauts (from left) Nick Hague and Christina Hammock Koch and cosmonaut Alexey Ovchinin will launch aboard the Russian Soyuz MS-12 spacecraft Feb. 28, 2019, from the Baikonour Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Image Credit: NASA.
Hague and Koch will serve as flight engineers for Expeditions 59 and 60. Ovchinin will serve as a flight engineer on Expedition 59 and the commander of Expedition 60. The trio will return to Earth in October 2019 as members of Expedition 60.
All three crew members will participate in a news conference at 2 p.m. Wednesday, Dec. 12, at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston that will air live on NASA TV and the agency’s website.
This will be Koch’s first spaceflight. Flight dynamics specialists determined Hague and Ovchinin achieved enough altitude on their aborted climb to orbit to qualify for previous spaceflight status, making this Hague’s second spaceflight and Ovchinin’s third.
Related links:
Expedition 57: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition57/index.html
Expedition 58: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition58/index.html
Expedition 59: https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-astronaut-nick-hague-set-for-new-space-station-mission-after-abort
Science investigations: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/index.html
U.S. National Laboratory: https://www.iss-casis.org/
Forest observation: https://iss-science.jsc.nasa.gov/investigation_detail.cfm?investigationsid=2905
Robotic refueling: https://orbiterchspacenews.blogspot.com/2018/11/nasa-to-launch-new-refueling-mission.html
Satellite deployment: https://iss-science.jsc.nasa.gov/investigation_detail.cfm?investigationsid=2897
Space Station Research and Technology: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/index.html
International Space Station (ISS): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html
Images (mentioned), Video, Text, Credits: NASA/Marck Garcia/NASA TV/SciNews.
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