NASA Sets Briefing, TV Coverage of Japan's First Cargo Spacecraft

NASA will hold a news briefing at 12:30 p.m. CDT on Wednesday, Sept. 2, to preview the maiden launch and flight of Japan's unpiloted H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV) cargo spacecraft to the International Space Station.

NASA Television will broadcast the briefing live from NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston. Participants in the briefing will include officials from NASA and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). NASA TV also will broadcast live HTV's launch and flight.

The HTV is scheduled to lift off on an H-IIB rocket from JAXA's Tanegashima Space Center in southern Japan at approximately noon Sept. 10 (about 2 a.m. Sept. 11 Japan time). NASA TV coverage of the launch will begin at 11:45 a.m. The HTV will augment the European Space Agency's Automated Transportation Vehicles and the Russian Progress ships that deliver supplies to the space station.

NASA conducted an HTV readiness review on Aug. 27. The HTV was formally approved for flight and rendezvous. The launch window will be open from Sept. 10-30. In the event of a launch postponement after the H-IIB rocket is fueled, a 72-hour turnaround will be required before the next launch attempt.

As the 16.5-ton cargo craft makes its week-long journey to the space station, flight controllers in Tsukuba, Japan, and at Mission Control in Houston will conduct a number of tests of HTV's rendezvous and navigation systems.

NASA TV coverage of the cargo craft's arrival at the station will begin at 2 p.m. Sept. 17. As the HTV moves within about 40 feet of the orbiting laboratory, space station crew members will capture the craft using the station's Canadarm2 robotic arm. The crew then will attach the HTV to an Earth-facing docking port on the station's Harmony connecting module. The robotic maneuvers are set to begin at about 2:50 p.m. Sept. 17.

The HTV will remain attached to the station for about six weeks while supplies are transferred. In addition to interior supplies and equipment, two new experiments carried on the exterior of the HTV will be moved to the Japanese Kibo module's external experiment porch using a combination of maneuvers with the station's Canadarm2 and Kibo's robotic arm.

Payette had cookies stolen while in orbit

Julie Payette returns to CSA headquarters to a reception numbering three hundred, welcoming her back after her 16 days stay in orbit an on-board the International Space Station.

Max Harrold
Montreal Gazette

Longueuil — A fellow astronaut stole her maple cookies, and Julie Payette borrowed the only sweater of Canadian crew mate Bob Thirsk while working last month aboard the chilly space shuttle, 350 kilometres above the Earth.

With behind-the-scenes tidbits and off-world snapshots from her history-making, task-packed 16-day mission to space July 15 to 31, Payette commanded everyone’s attention Friday at the Canadian Space Agency’s headquarters on the South Shore.

It was Payette’s first time back at the mothership of Canada’s space program since the mission, and about 300 CSA employees cheered her as they lined the agency’s modest yet soaring atrium.

“Bravo,” CSA head of operations Benoît Marcotte told Payette. “What a superbly successful mission.”

Payette said she was grateful for the team’s efforts. In space, she took a group photo of the Longueuil workers against a porthole with the Earth seen below.

Payette, 45, served as the flight engineer on the crew of the space shuttle Endeavour, which flew to the International Space Station.

The crew completed the construction of the Kibo Japanese Experiment Module, also known as the space porch, and installed scientific experiments on it.

Payette didn’t do any of the five spacewalks during the mission, but she played a crucial role at the controls of three robotic arms that grappled equipment stowed in shuttle’s payload bay and then handed it off to another robot arm that then placed it in position with spacewalking astronauts assisting.

Asked if she had any close calls during the robotic operations, Payette said yes.

“I can assure you there usually are when you are handing off pieces of equipment that weigh 600 or 700 pounds and you are bringing them within centimetres of a billion-dollar space station.”

Read the full feature article HERE.

Koichi Wakata changes his underware; first time in a month.

Japan's first ISS expedition crew member arrived back on Earth on-board Endeavour, with STS-127 on Friday.

For the entirety of Koichi Wakata's final month on-board ISS may have been his most uncomfortable for more than one reason. Koichi wore the same experimental under-garments for four weeks.

There was no report immediately available on how soon the first calibrator of Japan's new ISS Kibo module changed his clothes after Endeavour came to "wheels stop."

According to C/NET, "Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata, who returned to earth Friday, had been on the International Space Station since March," wrote Chris Matyszczyk. "And, well, I don't know quite how I am to put this, but he didn't change his underwear for a month."

"I know what you're thinking. We're both thinking the same thing.

"Not even in the the darkest, most slovenly days of our student youth did we wear the same pair of knickers for 30 days. Around seven days was our limit. Then we'd at least manage a hand wash in a sink.

"But here was the intrepid Wakata, prepared for the sake of all our futures to don anti-static, flame-resistant, odor-eating, bacteria-killing, water-absorbent underpants. Yes, water-absorbent."

Read the posting HERE.

STS-127

Moon over Endeavour (UPI)

KSC (UPI) - NASA says it's planning the final events prior to space shuttle Endeavour's STS-127 June mission to the International Space Station.

STS-127 will be the 32nd construction flight to ISS, the last of a series of three flights dedicated to the assembly of the JAXA Kibo laboratory. NASA officials say Endeavour will be moved from Launch Pad 39B to pad 39A Saturday, with the STS-127 crew's Terminal Countdown Demonstration Test between May 31-June2.

Endeavour had, of course, been stationed at 39B in on stand-by as STS-400, an emergency rescue operation if necessary during the repair mission to the Hubble Space Telescope by the crew of Atlantis.

The launch of STS-127 is presently scheduled for June 13 at 7:17 a.m. EDT.

Korea & Japan seek ISS collaboration

Kim Tong-hyung
Staff Reporter - The Korea Times

South Korea, a latecomer in the Asian space race, is constantly looking to tap technology and experience of more advanced nations, and Japan seems to be the latest target.

The Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI), the country’s space agency, said it is talking with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) over possible collaboration on several experiments aboard the International Space Station (ISS).

The experiments will be conducted on Japan’s Kibo ISS module ― which will be completed during the first half of this year ― sometime around 2012...

Read more HERE.

Endeavour GO for Night Lunch 2:29 AM

STS-123 Boost Phase visible from KSC to New York

SPACE TRAVEL

NASA SPACEFLIGHT said all systems were "go" for the launch of space shuttle Endeavour and its STS-123 mission to the International Space Station.

The shuttle is to lift off at 2:29 a.m. EDT Tuesday from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The shuttle's seven astronauts will, among other things, deliver the first section of the Japanese-built Kibo laboratory and the Canadian Space Agency's two-armed robotic system called Dextre.

At 6 a.m. Monday, the rotating service structure that provides access and weather protection for Endeavour was retracted, clearing the way for loading about 500,000 gallons of liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen propellants into the shuttle's external fuel tank Monday evening.

NASA said the weather forecast called for a 10 percent chance that atmospheric conditions would delay the launch, although meteorologists said they were concerned about the slight chance of a low cloud ceiling around Kennedy at launch time.

STS-123 will be commanded by Dominic Gorie with Gregory Johnson serving as shuttle pilot. The crew includes astronauts Rick Linnehan, Robert Behnken, Mike Foreman, Garrett Reisman and Japanese astronaut Takao Doi.