Russian space agency Roscosmos has announced this week that it hopes to launch its own orbiting space station by 2025. The agency is considering withdrawing from the ISS program and operating its own space station. Roscosmos head Dmitry Rogozin says that work has already begun on the first module for the space station.
NASA astronaut Kate Rubins and two Russian crewmates, Sergey Ryzhikov and Sergey Kud-Sverchkov, have returned safely to Earth. The crew members returned to Earth after six months of being station aboard the ISS. They departed the ISS aboard a Soyuz MS-17 spacecraft at 9:34 p.m. EDT on Friday.
Boeing has been evaluating a new target launch date for its next Starliner mission over the last several weeks. The next test flight for the Starliner capsule won't have crew aboard. The mission will launch aboard an Atlas V rocket and dock with the ISS, spending about a week on the orbiting space station before returning to Earth. This test flight is expected to happen in July or early August, but no official date has been announced.
It's the 40th anniversary of the NASA Space Shuttle Program, and the US space agency is celebrating with a new video about the pivotal launch on April 12, 1981. That's when Space Shuttle Columbia took off for the first time with astronauts John Young and Bob Crippen tightly strapped inside, beginning what was arguably a golden age of American exploration beyond the confines of Earth.
The International Space Station is looking a little crowded this week, with a NASA astronaut two Russian cosmonauts safety arriving at the orbiting science platform and bringing its current occupant count to 10. The three new residents - NASA's Mark Vande Hei and Roscosmos' Oleg Novitskiy and Pyotr Dubrov - launched yesterday on a Soyuz MS-18 spacecraft.
NASA has shared a video and images of the launch of Expedition 64/65 crew members to the ISS. Recently, American astronauts have been traveling to the ISS aboard SpaceX capsules. This time, the trio of astronauts, including one NASA astronaut and two Russian cosmonauts, lifted off from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Astronauts aboard the Expedition 65 mission include Russian cosmonaut Pyotr Dubrov of Roscosmos, Russian cosmonaut Oleg Novitskiy of Roscosmos, and NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei.
SpaceX's Crew Dragon capsule has done what no other commercial spacecraft has before it, successfully moving between ports at the International Space Station. The repositioning of the Crew Dragon "Resilience" - which has been at the ISS since mid-November 2020 - is an important demonstration of the spacecraft's ability to autonomously navigate and relocate around the orbiting technology and research platform.
Recently we talked a bit about NASA and the $400 million contest it was holding to get private companies to design space stations. NASA needs private companies to design new space stations as the ISS is aging, and NASA doesn't want to foot the bill for the replacement. NASA wants private industry to take over operations in low-Earth orbit when the ISS comes to an end.
NASA is gearing up to send astronauts to Mars in the coming decades, and part of the gear-up is studying the effects of long-term space travel on humans. A new study was published by scientists at UT Southwestern that found the heart of an astronaut who spent nearly a year in space aboard the ISS shrank despite regular exercise. The study found that while the astronaut's heart shrank, it continued to function well.
The privatization of space travel and placing satellites into orbit has been great for NASA and the United States in general. NASA now wants to get private companies to develop and build new space stations and has offered up to $400 million in funding to as many as four companies. The funding would be offered under the Commercial LEO Destinations (CLD) project.
Crew members aboard the ISS climbed into a docked Soyuz capsule on Friday. A pair of Russian cosmonauts and a NASA astronaut strapped into the capsule to move it to a different docking port aboard the ISS. The currently docked Soyuz capsule was moved to open the docking port for new crewmembers that are arriving at the space station next month.
NASA teamed up with high school students to develop a new tape dispenser for the orbiting International Space Station. Just as it is for many here on earth, on the ISS, gray duct tape is a commonly used item for repairing all manner of problems, including air leaks. However, there hasn't been a good way to dispense the tape on the ISS, and NASA leaned on high school students to design a new tape dispenser.