Exactly at at 9:36 pm EDT Wednesday, July 6, three astronauts were launched into space to begin their mission aboard the International Space Station (ISS). “Rocket is on the launchpad, crew is ready to go!”
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Three astronauts were blasted into space for a two-day trip to the International Space Station.
The crew members, Kate Rubins of NASA, Russian cosmonaut Anatoly Ivanishin and Takuya Onishi from Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), left the ground at around 9:36 on Wednesday after a smooth liftoff.
The crew members also are scheduled to receive Orbital ATK’s sixth commercial resupply mission and two Russian Progress resupply flights delivering several tons of food, fuel, supplies and research. They will join the astronauts already present at the space station, including the station’s commander, NASA astronaut Jeff Williams, and Russian cosmonauts Oleg Skripochka and Alexey Ovchinin.
Soyuz MS introduces a number of systems upgrades on the time-tested Russian spacecraft, primarily focused on the vehicle’s navigation, control and communications system.
The Soyuz MS modification has a new command and telemetry system enabling it to use the Luch data relay satellites; it also has other new equipment.
The launch will take place from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, the same place that hosted the launch of Yuri Gagarin into space.
Known as the Soyuz-MS, the new vessel features an all-digital control system, streamlined internal hardware, and more efficient solar panels.
On top of that, Ivanishin said before launch, “we have a new radar, it has become more reliable, less weight and as a result, we have changes in the rendezvous file”. They will spend an anticipated four months aboard the orbiting space platform.
“This is the only laboratory we have as humans to study gravity as a variable …”
“It’s really a way to investigate what happens to physiological beings, to their individual cells and their tissues when you don’t have gravity”.
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NASA and Boeing representatives will discuss the first of two identical worldwide docking adapters (IDA) that will be installed on the space station.
