The view of the main pressurized modules of ISS from
the astronauts during US EVA-35. Credit: NASA
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This year, the International Space Station turns 16 years old—at least some of the pieces. This was the year that ISS program was originally supposed to end. In 2010, all five space station partner agencies decided to delay that to 2020. Even now, talks are underway to continue the life of the outpost to 2024.
Had the decision held to end the program, it is arguable that the burgeoning commercial cargo and crew industries would still be a decade or more away. Instead, today, active private cargo ships are routinely delivering supplies to the station. Next year, commercial crews will begin visiting the outpost. This year, Bigelow Aerospace, a company that develops expandable space habitats, will have it's first module attached to the ISS, and there are talks of a private airlock being added to ISS by 2018.
Instead of planning for the disposal the 400 ton satellite into the Pacific Ocean this year, mission planners are busy working on "traffic jams" of visiting vehicles constantly coming and going to and from the station. They do this all while working on training for more than a half-dozen spacewalks.
This year promises to be one of the busiest at the outpost. Starting in March, the first of up to five SpaceX Dragon cargo ships will be launched to resupply the orbiting lab. Commercial Resupply Service 8 will be a return to flight for SpaceX's Dragon cargo ship after a launch mishap in June of last year during the CRS-7 mission. The company already returned the Falcon 9 booster to flight in December.
BEAM seen attached to Tranquility's aft port. Photo Credit: NASA |
BEAM is a small test module that will study the structural integrity, leakage, radiation exposure and more, during its two year stay on the outpost. Afterwords, it will be removed and allowed to burn up in the atmosphere. Bigelow Aerospace intends to use a similar design for an airlock on it's eventual private space stations sometime in the 2020s.
SpaceX will launch International Docking Adapter 2 in March on CRS-9. This will be attached to Pressurized Mating Adapter 2 on forward end of Harmony. IDA-1 was originally supposed to be attached there, however, it was lost during CRS-7.
A replacement, IDA-3, will be launched on a future SpaceX Dragon flight. It will be attached to PMA-3. To prepare for that, it will be moved from it's current location (port side of Tranquility) to the zenith port of Harmony.
Cygnus OA-4 as seen from the ISS crew below the station moments before being captured by the space stations robotic arm. Photo Credit NASA |
If the schedule holds, SpaceX and Orbital ATK should both have cargo ships berthed to the space station at the same time in late spring or early summer.
While commercial resupply is poised to have it's biggest year yet, the Russian's plan to continue their steady supply of Progress spacecraft. Three are scheduled to launch this year - all of which are of the new modernized MS variant. Additionally, Japan will launch it's HTV-6 cargo ship in October. In all, up to 12 resupply ships could reach the station in 2016.
In March, the first one-year crew members on the ISS are scheduled to return to Earth. Scott Kelly and Mikhail Korniyenko launched in late March 2015 and are scheduled to return to Earth on March 3, 2016. Also leaving with them will be Sergey Volkov, who launched in September 2015.
Launching a couple of weeks later, Soyuz TMA-20M will take Russian cosmonauts Aleksey Ovchinin and Oleg Skripochka as well as NASA astronaut Jeffrey Williams. They will stay aboard as part of Expedition 47 and 48 and return to Earth in September. This will put Williams about 14 days ahead of Kelly as the most experienced U.S. astronaut with a cumulative 534 days over four missions.
A new Soyuz model, called MS, will replace the TMA-M series currently serving the space station. Photo Credit: NASA |
Launching on Soyuz MS-2 in September to be part of Expedition 49 will be NASA astronaut Robert Kimbrough and Russian cosmonauts Andrei Borisenko and Sergey Ryzhikov. They will land in March 2017.
Finally, in November, the 50th expedition to the orbiting outpost will launch. Soyuz MS-3 will carry NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson, Russian cosmonaut Oleg Novitskiy and French astronaut Tomas Pesquet. They will stay in space till May 2017.
So far in 2016, the ISS has seen one extravehicular activity. US EVA-35 saw astronauts Tim Kopra and Tim Peake step outside to fix a failed power regulator. The Sequential Shunt Unit, as it is called, failed in November and needed to be replaced at the earliest convenience.
The SSU was fixed, and other tasks completed as well, however, only a few hours into the spacewalk, water was discovered in Kopra's helmet forcing a "termination" of the EVA. The suit will be evaluated before used further.
This month, the ISS should see a Russian EVA, as well as the departure of the Cygnus currently berthed at the Earth facing port of Node 1.
A highlight video of EVA-35, which occurred on Jan. 15.
Video courtesy of NASA.
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