mike hopkins Archives

December 17, 2013December 23, 2015 by Elizabeth Howell

Astronauts Get Three Spacewalks As An Early Christmas Present

The Expedition 38 crew tests spacesuits in preparation for December spacewalks to replace a pump for the International Space Station's cooling system. In the spacesuits are NASA astronauts Mike Hopkins (left) and Rick Mastracchio. Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata is in the foreground, with Russian commander Oleg Kotov behind. Credit: NASA TV

The week before Christmas will be full of spacewalk preparations for Expedition 38 as they get ready to remove and replace a malfunctioning pump aboard the International Space Station.

NASA astronauts Rick Mastracchio and Mike Hopkins will participate in the spacewalks, NASA said today (Dec. 17), with Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata handling robotic operations during the Dec. 21, Dec. 23 and Dec. 25 activities.

A new pump is needed to regulate temperatures in an external ammonia cooling loop that shut down automatically Wednesday (Dec. 11) when it got too cold. The loop keeps equipment at the right temperature on station. While the astronauts have been fine for the past week, several redundant systems and some experiments are offline. Luckily for the crew, other astronauts previously installed three spare pumps on station, which you can see in the graphic below.

Locations of spare pumps on the International Space Station as of December 2013. Credit: NASA

Spacewalks are always a risky proposition, and NASA has not conducted any since Italian astronaut Luca Parmitano experienced a leak in an American spacesuit in July. As such, the agency spent several days trying to fix the cooling loop by other means.

A faulty control valve made the pump malfunction on Wednesday. The valve normally mixes warm ammonia that flows past external radiators on station with cooler ammonia that was put through those radiators. NASA first tried to control the valve from the ground, then focused its attention on an isolation control valve upstream from the pump that the agency hoped could serve as a backup. The isolation valve, however, was only designed to be closed or opened fully — not positioned in between.

As of 11 a.m. EST (4 p.m. UTC) today, NASA was working on a software patch to try to freeze the valve in different positions to manually regulate the flow of ammonia.

“The fidelity that we have here on the ground to precisely control when that valve starts moving and stops is on the order of about 0.2 seconds, 0.3 seconds, somewhere in that range. We really need the fidelity to be much higher than that,” said Judd Frieling, the Expedition 38 lead flight director, in an update on NASA Television.

“We need it to be on the order of 0.1 seconds. So the way we can reliably produce that is by putting some software on the computers on board that basically allows us to get that finer control. So engineers and coders, overnight, have been working on a software — we call it a patch — software fix, to one of the computers that controls that valve.”

NASA planned to upload the patch to the station this afternoon (EST) to see if it was possible to control the isolation valve by telling it to move, then cutting the power when it got to a certain spot. The agency did not say how successful that fix was, but will likely address that in a media briefing tomorrow at 3 p.m. EST (8 p.m. UTC).

Cooling problems have occurred on station before. The most recent failure was a leak in May, which the Expedition 35 crew fixed just days before some of the astronauts went home. A more prominent failure on the same cooling loop occurred in 2010, when Expedition 24 astronauts performed three spacewalks to replace a faulty pump.

Each of the three emergency spacewalks this month (Dec. 21, 23 and 25) will start at 7:10 a.m. EST (12:10 p.m. UTC) and take about 6.5 hours to perform, NASA added. The activities will be carried live on NASA Television, with coverage starting about an hour before each spacewalk is expected to begin.

November 27, 2013December 23, 2015 by Elizabeth Howell

Astronauts To Chase Down Turkey Meal For Thanksgiving

NASA astronaut Rick Mastracchio inspects a spacesuit during repairs in the Quest airlock aboard the International Space Station. Taken during Expedition 38 in November 2013. Credit: NASA

Judging from the way those food packets are floating around, looks like the folks on the International Space Station will have to catch their turkey! NASA astronauts Rick Mastracchio and Mike Hopkins, two of the six people working on Expedition 38, recently shared their plans for U.S. Thanksgiving on Thursday.

“Though we miss our families, it’s great to be in space. As astronauts, this is what we train for and this is where we want to be. Opportunities to fly in space are rare, so we have to take advantage of them whenever they occur,” Hopkins said in the message.

The best part of this missive? Watching the astronauts casually toss the microphone back and forth in between their statements. That’s the fun of recording in microgravity.

Thanksgiving will be a full workday on station as the astronauts continue to work on their experiments. A recent status report indicated that Mastracchio (the crew medical officer) was examining Hopkins’ eyes as part of ongoing work looking at how microgravity affects ocular health. Flight controllers also moved one of the solar arrays for Mastracchio to take pictures and monitor how the mast is doing “for future inspections”, NASA stated.

October 25, 2013December 23, 2015 by Elizabeth Howell

What Caused The Spacesuit Leak? Astronauts Are Working To Hunt That Down

NASA astronauts Mike Hopkins and Karen Nyberg (edge of picture, at left) examine a faulty spacesuit aboard the International Space Station during Expedition 37 in October 2013. In July 2013, Italian astronaut Luca Parmitano had to abort a spacewalk after a water leak arose while wearing the spacesuit. The cause is still under investigation. Credit: NASA/YouTube (screenshot)

Here’s the latest attempt to hunt down the water leak that aborted Luca Parmitano’s spacewalk in July: two astronauts aboard the International Space Station removed and replaced a fan pump and water separator inside the spacesuit earlier this week.

All spacewalks with NASA suits are on hold while the agency investigates the leak, and they have been trying mightily. In late July, then on-station NASA astronaut Chris Cassidy demonstrated how the pool of water spread within the helmet (as you can see in these YouTube videos).

This week, on-orbit NASA astronauts Mike Hopkins and Karen Nyberg delved further. While the astronauts are trained before their missions on some suit repairs, this particular type was not something that was covered before they left Earth. After Mission Control walked them through what to do, the astronauts proceeded cautiously as they did the work, NASA said.

“Our engineering teams have identified several different components of the suit, designing a big fault tree, and this is just one of the components that we think could have contributed to the leak in the suit,” said Alex Kanelakos, an extra-vehicular activity flight controller and astronaut instructor, in a new YouTube video.

“Specifically, the water separator is what we’re concentrating our efforts on today.”

As Kanelakos explained, a motor inside the suit drives the fan pump and water separator. The fan circulates oxygen, and the pump pumps the coolant fluid. The water separator, meanwhile, takes out moisture (water) from the ventilation loop and gas that could be trapped inside the water coolant loop. The dried-out air is then returned to the crew member for breathing, and the cycle continues.

Astronaut Chris Cassidy works with Luca Parmitano's spacesuit, which had a water leak on July 16, 2013. Credit: NASA — Astronaut Chris Cassidy works with Luca Parmitano’s spacesuit, which had a water leak on July 16, 2013. Credit: NASA

In September, Cassidy told Universe Today that the spacesuit is expected to come back to Earth during a future SpaceX Dragon cargo flight. That type of spacecraft is (unusually among space trucks) designed to survive re-entry in the atmosphere, allowing engineers on the ground to examine the spacesuit after it comes back.

Cassidy added that the situation was serious, and he supported NASA’s decision to end the spacewalk (which he was also participating in.) He didn’t think, however, that Parmitano was in immediate danger of drowning. For his part, Parmitano wrote a blog post on the European Space Agency website after his spacewalk, saying that space is an “inhospitable” arena.

Italian astronaut Luca Parmitano during a spacesuit fit check before his mission. Credit: NASA

As any astronaut is trained to do, Parmitano did consider other contingencies while the leak was happening, he wrote:

“The only idea I can think of is to open the safety valve by my left ear: if I create controlled depressurisation, I should manage to let out some of the water, at least until it freezes through sublimation, which would stop the flow. But making a ‘hole’ in my spacesuit really would be a last resort,” he wrote.

That fix, however, was not implemented as Parmitano and Cassidy made their way back to the station in time for their crewmates to repressurize the hatch and bring their Italian crewmate safely inside.

Besides investigating the spacesuit, NASA has an ongoing parallel investigation to look at “lessons learned” from the mishap and ways of implementing procedures to stop such an incident from happening again.

October 17, 2013December 23, 2015 by Elizabeth Howell

Topsy-Turvy Aurora Caught On Astronaut’s Camera

"The pic doesn't do the northern lights justice. Covered the whole sky. Truly amazing!" wrote NASA astronaut Mike Hopkins on Twitter Oct. 9.

Isn’t that aurora facing the wrong way? Not if you’re in space!

NASA astronaut Mike Hopkins tweeted this picture from his perch on the International Space Station a few days ago. He sounds jazzed to be on his first mission: “Can’t believe this is really me from the Cupola and that I’ve been in space for almost 3 weeks now!” he wrote on Twitter Oct. 15.

We’d be pretty excited, too! Luca Parmitano (from the European Space Agency) is also on his first trip into space. In between their many experiments, the rookies must relish the opportunity to take pictures of the view. Which image of theirs below is your favorite? Did we miss any notable shots? Let us know in the comments.

"Blue liquid silk folds and unfolds in the #Caribbean." European Space Agency astronaut Luca Parmitano, Oct. 16, 2013. (Twitter) — “Blue liquid silk folds and unfolds in the #Caribbean.” European Space Agency astronaut Luca Parmitano, Oct. 16, 2013. (Twitter)

"Not something you see every day first hand. With features like this, Dubai stands out from 260 miles up." NASA astronaut Mike Hopkins, Oct. 14, 2013. (Twitter) — “Not something you see every day first hand. With features like this, Dubai stands out from 260 miles up.” NASA astronaut Mike Hopkins, Oct. 14, 2013. (Twitter)

"The sculpted mountains of the Iranian deserts." European Space Agency astronaut Luca Parmitano, Oct. 15, 2013. (Twitter) — “The sculpted mountains of the Iranian deserts.” European Space Agency astronaut Luca Parmitano, Oct. 15, 2013. (Twitter)

"What remains of Hurricane Phailin after it reached land." European Space Agency astronaut Luca Parmitano, Oct. 13, 2013. (Twitter) — “What remains of Hurricane Phailin after it reached land.” European Space Agency astronaut Luca Parmitano, Oct. 13, 2013. (Twitter)

And of course, they’re grinning like crazy up there.