Station Crew Works Earth, Human Research and Preps for Cargo Missions
The Expedition 75 crew spent Thursday cleaning up after a spacewalk, servicing advanced Earth imagery gear, and studying how to protect the human body in microgravity. The International Space Station is also gearing up for a cargo mission swap next week to replenish the seven orbital residents.
Station commander Jessica Meir of NASA and flight engineer Sophie Adenot of ESA (European Space Agency) worked together throughout Thursday in the Quest airlock stowing the tools and tethers they used during a spacewalk on Sept. 1. Afterward, Meir joined NASA flight engineer Jack Hathaway as he guided her during an eye exam that imaged her retina, cornea, and lens as researchers on the ground monitored in real time. Adenot wore the EasyMotion-2 suit, programmed it to send electrical impulses, then measured the muscle contractions that may supplement a space workout. Doctors are constantly monitoring astronaut health and comparing biomedical data collected from previous missions to ensure crew fitness and wellbeing on long-duration missions to the Moon, Mars, and beyond.
Hathaway spent most of his shift on Thursday transferring cargo in and out of Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus XL cargo spacecraft berthed to the Unity module’s Earth-facing port. He also spent some time cleaning the Mochii miniature electron microscope and the MUSES high-resolution, hyperspectral Earth-imaging system. NASA flight engineer Anil Menon worked in the Kibo laboratory module removing advanced Earth observation gear placed outside in the vacuum of space to demonstrate streaming of ultra-high-resolution hyperspectral imagery and study atmospheric dynamics.
Roscosmos flight engineer Pyotr Dubrov is loading trash and obsolete gear for disposal inside the Progress 94 resupply spacecraft before it undocks from the Poisk module on Monday, Sept. 7. Progress 94 will be replaced by the Progress 96 resupply spacecraft after it launches from Kazakhstan’s Baikonur Cosmodrome on Sept. 9 for an automated docking two days later to Poisk’s vacated port.
Roscosmos flight engineers Anna Kikina and Andrey Fedyaev partnered together and installed Earth observation gear to automatically photograph Earth landmarks during the crew’s sleep shift. Kikina also measured her blood pressure using arm, wrist, and finger cuffs for a long-running cardiovascular investigation. Fedyaev transferred fluids into the departing Progress 94 spacecraft, inspected laptop computers, and tested camera sensors.
Learn more about station activities by following the space station blog, @space_station on X, as well as the ISS Facebook and ISS Instagram accounts.
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Mark A. Garcia
