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1\29 ISS On-Orbit Status 29-01-2003
Part 1 of 2

ISS On-Orbit Status 1/29/03

All ISS systems continue to function nominally, except as noted 
previously or below.

Packing continued on board for Saturday's Progress 9P undocking. 
Today's schedule had three hours reserved for the deorbit stowage 
activities that again were video-recorded with the Sony PD-100, with 
subsequent downlink of the video survey at 6:25am EST. [Discarded 
stuff includes such diverse items as four 800A batteries, ten old 
smoke detectors, 20 solid waste containers, four BRPK air/water 
separator units, filters, liquid containers, old bubble gum, worn 
suits and other pieces of clothing, dozens of personal hygiene items, 
etc.]

Undocking of 9P/Progress M1-258 (M1-9) is still set for 2/1 at 10:59am 
EST.  Half an hour earlier (10:29am), ISS will maneuver to undock 
attitude.  Progress deorbit burn starts at 2:10pm, lasting three 
minutes for 97.4 m/sec delta-V. Entry interface occurs at 2:47pm. 
[Early phase of the cargo ship's destructive reentry will be observed 
from the ISS with the Russian geophysical GFI-1 "Relaksatsiya" 
experiment, requiring small ISS attitude change.]

FE-1 Nikolai Budarin set up the video recording of the old IMV 
(intermodular ventilation) survey of 12/19/02 for downlink, initiated 
at 8:50am by the pre-set/automated daily timeline software (SPP). The 
IMV survey focused on the air ducts in the Service Module (SM/PkhO), 
FGB, Docking Compartment (DC-1) and Soyuz, with special attention to 
places where ducts bend, sag or twist.

Later, Budarin retrieved a mini-digital video cassette containing the
Russian geophysical GFI-1 "Relaksatsiya" observations of the Earth's 
limb during Soyuz 4S reentry on 11/9/02 and the Moon calibration 
recording of 12/16/02 for subsequent downlink to MCC-M/TsUP at 
10:25am. [Relaksatsiya deals with the study of the chemoluminescent 
chemical reactions ("relaxations") and atmospheric light phenomena 
that occur during high-velocity interaction between the exhaust 
products from space vehicles and the atmosphere at orbital altitude 
and during the entry of spacecraft into the Earth's upper atmosphere, 
such as Progress 9P.]

FE-2/SO Don Pettit continued his work on the ER3 ARIS (EXPRESS Rack 
3/active rack isolation system). [Today's scheduled activities of 
alignment guides removal (adjustment of four snubber pins), monitoring 
the hyperextension test and making ARIS snubber adjustments, were 
dependent on the success of some prior troubleshooting by the ground 
of the pushrod calibration attempted yesterday by Pettit, which 
encountered problems.]

The CDRA (carbon dioxide removal assembly) in the Lab was activated by
Pettit in support of today's initiation of EMU (extravehicular 
mobility unit) Metox (metal oxide) regeneration.

Regeneration of the first Metox canister in the Airlock (A/L) was 
started by Don Pettit at about 1:25pm. In support of regenerating the 
reusable CO2 absorbers, MCC-H also lowered the A/L temperature 
setpoint to 64 degF (17.8 degC) to keep the A/L cool until the second 
(and last) regeneration is completed in two days (Friday).

Before and after initiation of Metox regen, Pettit took CO2 readings 
of the cabin air in Lab and SM with the portable ACS CDMK (atmosphere 
control system/CO2 monitoring kit).

The ground conducted a calibration of the onboard VOA (volatile 
organics analyzer) and later ran a sampling analysis with the 
instrument. After the VOA calibration, MCC-H also commanded a full 
("zero") calibration run of the MCA (major constituents analyzer).

The Vozdukh CO2 scrubber was scheduled to be powered off at 1:30pm 
EST.

Budarin conducted his regular daily checkup, including watering if 
required, of the BIO-5 Rasteniya-2/Lada-2 ("Plants-2") experiment, 
which researches plant growth and development under space flight 
conditions.

Using the MO-21 "Ecosfera" air sampler and incubation equipment, 
broken out and set up yesterday, Budarin spent about 40 minutes 
collecting air samples for atmospheric microbial analysis. [MO-21 
determines microbial contamination of the ISS atmosphere, specifically 
the total bacterial and fungal microflora counts and microflora 
composition according to morphologic criteria of microorganism 
colonies.]

CDR Ken Bowersox performed the regular daily maintenance of SOSh life
support system (incl. ASU toilet) fluid lines and connections, as well 
as the daily Lab payload (PCG-STES010) status checkup, while Budarin 
prepared today's delta file for automated export to keep the IMS 
(inventory management system) database up to date.

Prepack planning activities for ULF-1 continue. Returned items will 
include two ZSRs (zero-G racks) from the Lab. They currently contain a 
large number of CTBEs (cargo transfer bag equivalents) which need to 
be relocated beforehand. [Launch of STS-114/ULF is set for NET (not 
earlier than) 3/1, and since its return cargo manifest is 
currentlyoverbooked in both the MPLM (multi-purpose logistics module) 
"Raffaello" and the Atlantis middeck, some priority selections will 
have to be made between now and early-March.]

The newly installed EarthKAM (Earth Knowledge Acquired by Middle 
school students) system was in operation throughout the day, taking 
pictures under pre-programmed control and downlinking the electronic 
images at regular intervals, without crew intervention required. 
[EarthKAM images can be found at
http://datasystem.earthkam..ucsd.edu/cgi-bin/datasys/ek_images_station 
]

Today's targets for the CEO (crew earth observations program) were 
Bangkok, Thailand (nadir pass; ESC [electronic still camera]. Crew was 
also to look for any smog plume rising from the city [looking right 
over the sea surface]), Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (nadir pass; ESC. This 
is an ancient Arab port in a trading system that has spanned the 
Indian Ocean for centuries.  Also looking for usually cloudy spice 
islands of Zanzibar and Pemba just offshore), Buenos Aires, Argentina 
(nadir and a touch left; ESC), Dakar, Senegal(nadir pass; ESC), Andean 
Landslide site, Chile (detailed mapping series for ~30 secs of 
landslide-prone hillsides near the top of the west-facing Andean 
slopes), and Caracas, Venezuela (nadir and a touch left; ESC).]

CEO images can be viewed at the website http://eol.jsc.nasa.gov

(continued)

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