A Progress supply ship. Image credit: NASA Click to enlarge
An unpiloted Russian Progress cargo ship docked to the aft port of the International Space Station (ISS) Zvezda module today at 10:42 a.m. EDT, as the Station flew 220 miles above Central Asia near northern Kazakhstan. The 19th Progress spacecraft to visit the ISS is carrying more than 5,000 pounds of supplies for the crew.
Expedition 11 Commander Sergei Krikalev and Flight Engineer John Phillips will check for leaks before opening the hatch to the Progress later today. They’ll begin unloading the cargo tomorrow.
The supplies include food, fuel, oxygen and air, clothing, experiment hardware, Russian spacesuit components and spare parts for the Vozdukh carbon dioxide removal system. A new water circulation liquids unit is onboard the supply ship. This unit is for the station’s Elektron oxygen-generating system which is inoperable. The unit will be installed next week to try to bring Elektron back into service.
The remainder of the Progress payload includes 1,763 pounds of propellant for the Russian thrusters; 242 pounds of oxygen and air in tanks as a backup supply for the oxygen generated by Elektron; and 463 pounds of water to augment the supplies left by the Space Shuttle Discovery during the STS-114 mission.
Some of the clothing and personal effects delivered to the station include items for the next resident crew, Expedition 12 Commander Bill McArthur and Flight Engineer Valery Tokarev. They are scheduled to launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan Oct. 1 in the Soyuz TMA-7 capsule.
Information about the crew’s activities on board the station, future launch dates, and sighting opportunities is available on the Web at: http://www.nasa.gov/station
Original Source: NASA News Release