Fwd: Additional system checks may cause delay in Soyuz docking with ISS

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From: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Date: March 27, 2014 8:55:39 AM CDT
To: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Subject: FW: Additional system checks may cause delay in Soyuz docking with ISS

 

 

Additional system checks may cause delay in Soyuz docking with ISS

 

March 26, 19:53 UTC+4
The docking might have been delayed because there was no certainty that everything was going smoothly, says space industry expert

 

EPA/MAXIM SHIPENKOV

MOSCOW, March 26. /ITAR-TASS/. A two-day delay in the docking of the Soyuz TMA-12M spaceship with the International Space Station (ISS) might have been caused by additional system checks, a space industry expert told ITAR-TASS on Wednesday, March 26.

"The docking might have been delayed because there was no certainty that everything was going smoothly. It might have been stopped for additional system checks. No one wants to put people aboard the ship at risk," the official said. "It may not necessarily have been some malfunction, but this may have raised some suspicions among specialists. If they are not certain, they will delay (the docking)," the expert said.

He noted that a ship was usually taken to the orbit automatically, with the Mission Control Center specialists monitoring the parameters. "Some of the specialists might not have liked the ship orientation parameters. After that, the Center cancelled the third command to the Soyuz thrust engine. Otherwise, if the command had been given to the disoriented craft, it could have been propelled into the wrong orbit," the expert said.

He stressed that the crew would have been brought back to earth in case of real danger.

The Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) will finish the investigation into the malfunction of the Soyuz TMA-12M spaceship's attitude control system on March 27, an informed source told ITAR-TASS.

The switchback from the fast-track six-hour rendezvous with the International Space Station (ISS) to the standard two-day procedure has been preliminarily blamed on a software hitch as a result of which the engines were not ignited the third time. "This is the main lead," the source said, adding that the ship was scheduled to dock with the ISS at about 04:00 Moscow time on March 28.

The Soyuz carrier rocket with the spaceship Soyuz TMA-12M carrying a new resident crew to the ISS blasted off from Baikonur at 01:17 Moscow time. Alexander Skvortsov and Oleg Artemyev of Russia, and Steven Swanson of NASA will work aboard the ISS for about five months.

The ship was initially supposed to dock with the ISS in six hours after the liftoff, at 07:04 Moscow time. However the docking was postponed and the ship was sent on a two-day rendezvous manoeuvre.

An official at the Mission Control Centre said the delay was caused by a computer failure to activate the attitude engines. Roscosmos Head Oleg Ostapenko blamed the delay on a malfunction of the ship's attitude control system.

Soyuz is now on the way to the ISS. The crewmembers are feeling well and busy doing their routine work, Mission Control Centre Head Sergei Krikalev said. They have enough water and food, and the ship has a sufficient supply of fuel to make a two-day flight before docking with the ISS where they are awaited by Mikhail Tyurin of Russia, Koichi Wakata of Japan, and Richard Mastracchio of NASA.

 

© Copyright 2014 ITAR-TASS. All rights reserved. 

 

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Soyuz on track for revised two-day station rendezvous

03/26/2014 12:13 PM 

By WILLIAM HARWOOD
CBS News

Russian flight controllers troubleshooting a glitch aboard the Soyuz TMA-12M spacecraft that interrupted a planned four-orbit rendezvous with the International Space Station Tuesday successfully uploaded a revised 34-orbit trajectory overnight, setting up a delayed docking Thursday.

While engineers have not yet determined what caused an apparent orientation error that prevented a rocket firing Thursday that was part of the original four-orbit rendezvous plan, officials said early Wednesday that two rocket firings had been executed as part of a revised "burn" plan and that the Soyuz spacecraft operated normally.

"Once it was determined we weren't going to be able to meet the four-orbit plan, we downloaded to what we call the 34-orbit rendezvous," said Kenny Todd, NASA's space station mission operations integration manager at the Johnson Space Center in Houston.

"That kicks off a series of additional burns that have to be done to start targeting station for rendezvous within 34 orbits. And the first couple of burns for that particular plan have been done, they've been done successfully, and (Russian flight controllers) got good confirmation."

During a morning communications session, Soyuz commander Alexander Skvortsov said he and his crewmates -- flight engineer Oleg Artemyev and NASA astronaut Steven Swanson -- were in good shape and pressing ahead with the revised rendezvous plan.

"At this point, the crew is in good shape, the vehicle appears to be in good shape, the computers are in good shape, the propulsion system is working," Todd said. "So at this point, everything looks real good."

If all goes well, Skvortsov will oversee an automated approach and docking at the space station's upper Poisk module around 7:58 p.m. EDT (GMT-4) Thursday. They will join Expedition 39 commander Koichi Wakata, cosmonaut Mikhail Tyurin and NASA astronaut Rick Mastracchio, boosting the lab's crew back to six.

The Soyuz TMA-12M spacecraft took off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 5:17 p.m. Tuesday (3:17 a.m. Wednesday local time). The ascent went smoothly and the spacecraft successfully executed the first two rendezvous rocket firings for a planned docking six hours -- four orbits -- after launch.

But the Soyuz apparently was not in the proper attitude, or orientation, for the third burn in the sequence and the rendezvous was interrupted. While engineers reviewed telemetry to figure out what caused the problem, flight controllers began implementing backup plans for the 48-hour, 34-orbit rendezvous.

Two-day Soyuz rendezvous plans were the norm for most of the space station's 15-year lifetime and Skvortsov flew one during his first flight to the lab complex in 2010.

The shorter four-orbit rendezvous was designed to reduce the time crews have to spend in the cramped Soyuz, but it requires extensive planning and precise timing to execute.

The shortened rendezvous plan was first tested in 2012 with an uncrewed Progress cargo ship. After additional test flights, four crewed Soyuz flights followed the fast-track trajectory. Skvortsov's crew would have been the fifth.

But the 34-orbit rendezvous profile is a well-understood alternative and Todd said the basic procedures are reviewed and updated before each launch, including this one.

"We're comfortable with this, we know how to do it," he said. "For every readiness review when we get ready to launch a Soyuz, we actually do the certification ... to support this 34-orbit case. And so we didn't have to go build new products, we didn't have to go and do a lot of new analysis. We were ready to support this."

 

 

© 2014 William Harwood/CBS News

 

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AVvgpKt5uCA&feature=player_embedded

Astronauts 'In Good Shape' As They Face Space Station Docking Delay

by Elizabeth Howell on March 26, 2014

The Expedition 39/40 crew gives a thumbs-up during quarantine prior to their March 25, 2014 launch from Kazakhstan. From left: Steve Swanson (NASA), Alexander Skvortsov (Roscosmos) and Oleg Artemyev (Roscosmos). Credit: NASA

Despite a problem that held up last night's International Space Station docking, the Expedition 39/40 crew is doing well as they execute a standard backup procedure to bring their Soyuz spacecraft to the station on Thursday, NASA said.

The crew was originally expected to dock with the station around 11 p.m. EDT (3 a.m. UTC), but an error with the spacecraft's position in space prevented the engines from doing a third planned "burn" or firing to make that possible, NASA said in an update.

"At this point, the crew is in good shape and the vehicle appears to be in good shape," said Kenny Todd, the space station's operations integration manager, in an interview on NASA TV Wednesday morning (EDT). "At this point, everything looks real good."

In fact, the spacecraft has done a couple of burns since to get it into the right spot for a docking Thursday evening, Todd added. (So it appears the crew just missed the window to get there on Tuesday night.) The underlying cause of the orientation problem was not mentioned in the interview, presumably because it's still being investigated.

NASA is quite familiar with a two-day route to the space station as up until last year, all crews took two days to get to the space station. This took place for 14 years until a rapider method of reaching the orbiting complex within hours was introduced.

The crew includes  Steve Swanson (NASA), Alexander Skvortsov (Roscosmos) and Oleg Artemyev (Roscosmos), who will join three people already on station when they arrive.

 

Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata plays around wiith humanoid robot Robonaut 2 during Expedition 39 in March 2014. Credit: NASA

Current station residents Koichi Wakata (the commander, of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency),  Rick Mastracchio (NASA) and Mikhail Tyurin (Roscosmos) got to sleep in this morning and had some minor modifications to their schedule because of the docking delay, Todd added.

Instead of taking the day off as planned, the crew will do some work. A planned ISS software update for last night is going to be pushed "down the line", Todd said, adding that the forthcoming SpaceX launch on Sunday and docking on Tuesday is still going ahead as planned.

We'll provide more updates as the situation progresses. Docking is scheduled for 7:58 p.m. EDT (11:58 p.m. UTC) Thursday and will be covered on NASA Television.

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