Crew heading to station on Soyuz
A new crew, launched by Russia, is heading to the International Space Station.
A new crew, launched by Russia, is heading to the International Space Station.
A new crew, launched by Russia, is heading to the International Space Station.
The Russian/ESA Mars 500 mission has completed a year of its 520-day simulated flight to Mars.
The crew, who spent 250 days working on maintenance and scientific experiments before a 30-day stint performing tasks on a simulated Martian surface, are currently on their “return trip” to Earth.
This simulated all-male flight is going better than the last:
In 1999, an experiment in the same Moscow warehouse fell to pieces after a Russian team captain forced a kiss on a Canadian woman, and two Russian crewmembers had a bloody fistfight.
The Russian greenhouse on ISS underwent an upgrade today.
The onboard greenhouse was dismantled in April last year, as a need arose to replace the outdated control unit, recalled head of the Rasteniya-2 (Plants-2) experiment, chief of the laboratory of the Institute of Medico-Biological Problems (IMBP) of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) Vladimir Sychev. In early 2010, the crop area of the orbital garden was extended twice – the second leaf chamber was delivered to the ISS in which the crew managed to harvest the Mizuna lettuce, before the greenhouse was dismantled. Now, the cosmonauts will plant in these two chambers different cultures – super-dwarf wheat and dwarf tomatoes.
As I described in detail in Leaving Earth, the Russians have decades of experience in growing plants in space, with the goal of not only providing a natural system to recycle the station’s atmosphere, but also giving the astronauts a morale-boosting activity (gardening) that also gives them something tasty to eat. Though the engineering has still not made it possible to germinate seeds in weightlessness and then have grow there, this will be an absolute requirement if humans are ever to travel to the planets and beyond to the stars.
Rough and fast: Riding a Soyuz back to Earth.
Another Soyuz upgrade in the works.
The first tourist in space was not Dennis Tito, but this woman from Britain.
The first Soyuz launch from the European spaceport in French Guiana is now scheduled for October.
NASA management appears ready to approve combining SpaceX’s next two test flights of the Dragon capsule and Falcon 9 rocket into one test flight. This despite Russian opposition.
The Soyuz launchsite in French Guiana has been declared ready for its first flight.
A mock Soyuz countdown is under way at Kourou, French Guiana.
Putin sacks the head of the Russian space agency.
The competition plays hardball: The Russians say “Nyet” to letting SpaceX’s Dragon capsule dock with ISS on its next flight.
A Soviet-era Vostok space capsule, flown prior to Gagarin as a test, has sold for $2.9M at a New York auction.
Stagnation haunts Russian space program.
Russian spaceship “Gagarin” arrives at ISS.
Russia is accelerating its space program.
“It is the first time that the government has allocated decent financing to us,” Anatoly Perminov, head of the Russian space agency Roscosmos, said in a phone interview on April 2. The agency’s $3.5 billion budget for 2011 has almost tripled since 2007, reaching the highest since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. “We can now advance on all themes a bit,” Perminov said.
Unlike 50 years ago, when beating the U.S. into space marked a geopolitical victory in the Cold War, Russia is focusing on the commercial, technological and scientific aspects of space travel. President Dmitry Medvedev has named aerospace one of five industries the government plans to nurture to help diversify the economy of the world’s largest energy supplier away from resource extraction.
Three astronauts were launched to ISS today in a Soyuz capsule the Russians have named Gagarin, in honor of the fiftieth anniversary of his flight on April 12.
Russia’s launch capability continues to expand: Not only will they be able to launch rockets from French Guiana this year, it looks like Russia’s western spaceport will be ready for its first launch by 2015.
The Daily Beast reports today that the last flight of the shuttle Endeavour has been delayed due to a schedule conflict with a Russian Progress freighter.
Note that this has not yet been confirmed by NASA.
Update from spaceref: NASA has rescheduled Endeavour’s launch for April 29.
Comparing the view of Earth, interpreted differently by Russian and American satellites.
Not bigots: Russia and Israel have agreed on a framework for cooperating in outer space.
The Russians have set the new date, April 5, for next manned Soyuz launch to ISS.
The first death in space.
An evening pause: Forty-six years ago today Alexei Leonov became the first man to walk in space. This Soviet-era film shows practically the entire event, using footage from two cameras. Unfortunately, I don’t speak Russian and it is not subtitled. I’d love it if someone out there could provide a translation.
Several things to note as you watch:
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Treasures from the Soviet Union’s space history.
Those private companies better get cracking! The Russians have raised their ticket price again, from $56 to $63 million per astronaut ride on a Soyuz.
Problems going up and going down: Not only are there issues with the Soyuz capsule that is scheduled to return to Earth on Wednesday, a problem in the communications system of the next Soyuz capsule has caused the Russians to delay its launch by at least one week.