ROSCOSMOS - Soyuz MS-12 Mission patch.
March 14, 2019
The Soyuz spacecraft carrying NASA astronauts Nick Hague and Christina Koch, and cosmonaut Alexey Ovchinin of Roscosmos docked to the International Space Station at 9:01 p.m. EDT while both spacecraft were flying about 250 miles over the Pacific Ocean just west of Peru. Expedition 59 officially began at the time of docking.
Aboard the space station, NASA astronaut Anne McClain, Expedition 59 Commander Oleg Kononenko of Roscosmos, and David Saint-Jacques of the Canadian Space Agency will welcome the new crew members when the hatches between the two spacecraft are opened following standard pressurization and leak checks.
Image above: Soyuz MS-12 arrived at the International Space Station at 9:01 p.m. ET, 255 miles just west off the coast of Peru. Image Credit: NASA TV.
The crew members will spend more than six months conducting about 250 science investigations in fields such as biology, Earth science, human research, physical sciences, and technology development. Seventy-five of the investigations are new and have never been performed in space. Some of the investigations 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.
Soyuz MS-12 docking
Highlights of upcoming investigations the crew will support include devices that mimic the structure and function of human organs, free-flying robots, and an instrument to measure Earth’s distribution of carbon dioxide.
Watch the hatch opening and welcome ceremony to follow live on NASA TV and the agency’s website beginning at 10:30 p.m.: https://www.nasa.gov/nasalive
Related article:
Crew Safely in Orbit After Successful Launch
https://orbiterchspacenews.blogspot.com/2019/03/crew-safely-in-orbit-after-successful.html
Related links:
Expedition 58: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition58/index.html
Expedition 59: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition59/index.html
NASA TV: https://www.nasa.gov/live/
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
Image (mentioned), Video, Text, Credits: NASA/Norah Moran/NASA TV/SciNews.
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