Space News reports that SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft “splashed down off the Florida coast Feb. 9, wrapping up a three-week private astronaut mission to the International Space Station. The Crew Dragon spacecraft Freedom splashed down at 8:30 a.m. Eastern off the coast from Daytona Beach, Florida, concluding the Ax-3 mission for Axiom Space.”
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Ax-3 Crew Dragon splashdown
(SciNews; YouTube)
SPACE reports that after weather delays over the past few days, the Ax-3 Crew Dragon is scheduled to undock from the ISS today at 9:20 a.m. ET.
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Reuters reported a four-man crew “arrived at the International Space Station (ISS) early on Saturday for a two-week stay in the latest such mission arranged entirely at commercial expense by Texas-based startup company Axiom Space.” Their arrival “came about 37 hours after the Axiom quartet’s Thursday evening liftoff in a rocketship from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida.”
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Florida Today reports that on Wednesday, the four person crew of NASA’s Artemis II mission “had a first chance to practice what their launch day will feel like.” In what is “called a dry dress rehearsal, the astronauts got suited up and took their new electric crew transportation vehicles for a spin to the launch pad.” Since the mission’s SLS rocket “is still in production at other NASA facilities nationwide, Wednesday’s practice run focused on preparing ground team support of the crew.” Slated to “launch from KSC as early as November of next year, Artemis II – the first lunar human spaceflight mission since 1972 – will send the four crew members on a trip around the moon and back deeper into space than any mission ever before.” This week’s launch day rehearsal “marked only the second time the prime crew of the Artemis II lunar mission has traveled to KSC since being announced in April.”
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UPI reports that when astronauts “travel to space, the experience depletes their red blood cells and bone, according to a new study.” Fortunately, it appears their bodies “can eventually replenish them after they’ve returned to Earth, thanks to fat stored in the bone marrow.” University of Ottawa Rehabilitation Physician and Researcher Guy Trudel, one of the authors of the study, said, “We found that astronauts had significantly less fat in their bone marrow about a month after returning to Earth. We think the body is using this fat to help replace red blood cells and rebuild bone that has been lost during space travel.” The new research “builds on Trudel’s earlier work, which found that astronauts’ bodies destroyed 54% more red blood cells during space travel than they normally would on Earth.” It’s known as “space anemia.” The research “is part of MARROW, which is an experiment looking at bone marrow health and blood production in space, with funding from the Canadian Space Agency.”
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CNN reported that the four astronauts “who make up the Crew-5 team aboard the International Space Station returned home from a five-month stay in space Saturday, splashing down in the Gulf of Mexico.” The SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule “disembarked from the space station at 2:20 am ET, beginning the final leg of the astronauts’ journey.” The spacecraft “then maneuvered back toward Earth before plunging back into the atmosphere for a landing off the coast of Tampa, Florida[,] just after 9 p.m. ET Saturday.” The capsule was hauled out of the ocean by rescue ships and the astronauts then got to breath fresh air for the first time in five months. The four crew members – NASA astronauts Nicole Mann and Josh Cassada, astronaut Koichi Wakata of JAXA, and cosmonaut Anna Kikina of the Russian space agency Roscosmos – “launched to the space station aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule this past October.”
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Dragon and Crew-5 NASA astronauts Nicole Mann and Josh Cassada, along with JAXA astronaut Koichi Wakata, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Anna Kikina splash down off the Florida coast at 9:02 p.m. ET on Saturday, March 11, after 157 days in space.
(SpaceX; YouTube)
Space.com reports that NASA’s SpaceX Crew-5 mission successfully launched to the International Space Station Wednesday from Kennedy Space Center’s historic Launch Pad 39A. Liftoff occurred at 12:00 p.m. EDT, “kicking off a roughly 29-hour journey to the orbiting lab.” The spacecraft is scheduled to dock at the ISS on Thursday at 4:57 p.m. ET. The mission’s “four spaceflyers are NASA’s Nicole Mann and Josh Cassada, Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata and cosmonaut Anna Kikina.” The launch “made Mann the first Native American woman to reach the final frontier and Kikina the first Russian to fly on a private American spacecraft.”
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NASA’s SpaceX Crew-5 Mission to the International Space Station (Official NASA Broadcast)
(NASA; YouTube)
SPACE reports that NASA announced Friday that it is considering every agency astronaut for Artemis missions. The announcement “rolls back a 2020 announcement that selected 18 astronauts for these missions.” NASA Johnson Space Center Astronaut Office head Reid Wiseman said, “The way I look at it, any one of our 42 active astronauts is eligible for an Artemis mission. We want to assemble the right team for this mission.
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 17, 2022 – Reston, Va. – The American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) Executive Director Dan Dumbacher made the following statement:
“AIAA welcomes the long overdue new monument honoring Apollo 1 Astronauts Virgil “Gus” Grissom, Edward White, and Roger B. Chaffee recently placed at Arlington National Cemetery. It appropriately reads, “Ad astra per aspera,” or “Through hardships to the stars.”
We remember the tragedy on January 27, 1967, when a flash fire occurred in the command module during a launch pad test of the Apollo/Saturn space vehicle and the three astronauts died. We commend the efforts of NASA and the space community to remind us of the sacrifices astronauts and their families have made in our pursuit of the space frontier.
As the largest professional technical society for the aerospace profession, AIAA recognizes the Apollo 1 crew as integral to the success of the Apollo program as the foundation of the ongoing human exploration of space. Today, the 30,000 professional and student members of AIAA carry on their pursuit, shaping the future of aerospace.”
AIAA Media Contact: Rebecca B. Gray, [email protected], 804-397-5270 cell
About AIAA
The American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) is the world’s largest aerospace technical society. With nearly 30,000 individual members from 91 countries, and 100 corporate members, AIAA brings together industry, academia, and government to advance engineering and science in aviation, space, and defense. For more information, visit aiaa.org, and follow AIAA on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram.
SPACE reports that China’s “three-person Shenzhou 14 mission arrived at Tianhe, the core module of the under-construction Tiangong, early Sunday morning (June 5), about six hours after lifting off from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the Gobi Desert.” The three Shenzhou 14 crewmembers “are expected to spend about six months aboard the 54-foot-long (16.6 meters) Tianhe (‘Harmony of the Heavens’), which launched to low Earth orbit in April 2021.” The three taikonauts – Chen Dong, Liu Yang, and Cai Xuzhe – “will conduct a variety of scientific experiments and educational outreach activities, perform several spacewalks and install some new equipment inside and outside Tianhe.”
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