Station Crew Cleans Up After Spacewalk, Studies Space Agriculture and Physics
The Expedition 72 crew kicked off the first week in February cleaning up after last week’s spacewalk and continuing its space agriculture and microgravity physics experiments. Other International Space Station science objectives planned on Monday included human research while the orbital residents kept up the maintenance of the orbital outpost.
NASA astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore, station Commander and Flight Engineer respectively, are cleaning up following the Jan. 30 spacewalk to remove radio communications hardware and search for microorganisms outside the space station. Williams worked in the Harmony module disassembling the radio frequency group antenna assembly that she removed during the five-hour and 26-minute spacewalk. Wilmore serviced the spacesuits that he and Williams wore last week cleaning and reconfiguring suit cooling loops as well as checking the suits’ electrical components.
NASA Flight Engineer Nick Hague began his day assisting Williams with the radio hardware teardown work in Harmony and packing the gear for stowage. Afterward, Hague moved to the Kibo laboratory module refilling water inside the JAXA’s (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) Plant Experiment Unit. The small botany research facility, located in Kibo’s Cell Biology Experiment Facility, is supporting an investigation exploring how ultraviolet radiation and weightlessness affect plant growth to learn how to grow food and sustain crews on long-term mission to the Moon, Mars, and beyond.
NASA Flight Engineer Don Pettit focused on space physics inside Kibo’s Multi-Purpose Small Payload Rack (MSPR) during the first half of his shift. He opened up the MSPR and swapped samples inside its Electrostatic Levitation Furnace that can safely heat materials above 2,000 degrees Celsius to measure their thermophysical properties, as well as synthesize new materials in microgravity. Pettit then joined after the crew’s lunchtime and trained to use ultrasonic inspection hardware.
Roscosmos Flight Engineers Ivan Vagner and Alexey Ovchinin participated in a test to understand how and improve the way international crews communicate with mission controllers from around the world. Ovchinin then spent the last half of his shift practicing on a computer futuristic spacecraft and robotic piloting techniques crews may use on potential planetary missions. Flight Engineer Aleksandr Gorbunov spent his day inspecting and photographing cargo stowage areas in the Zvezda service module and testing Roscosmos life support gear.
Learn more about station activities by following the space station blog, @space_station and @ISS_Research on X, as well as the ISS Facebook and ISS Instagram accounts.
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Mark Garcia
