ISS20: Expedition 1 Crew Departs for Russia

International Space Station welcomes first Progress resupply vehicle; STS-106 prepared for launch

Following the successful arrival of the Zvezda Service Module at the International Space Station (ISS) on July 26, 2000, the pace of activity to prepare the facility for its first occupants increased significantly. After only one launch (STS-101) to station in the first six months of the year, the second half of 2000 saw seven launches, including the Expedition 1 crew of Commander William M. Shepherd, Flight Engineer and Soyuz Commander Yuri P. Gidzenko, and Flight Engineer Sergei K. Krikalev. The crew completed its training in Houston and departed for Russia for the final time as the first Progress resupply ship arrived at ISS. At NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, workers prepared Space Shuttle Atlantis for its next visit to the station.

Left: Expedition 1 crewmates (left to right) Yuri Gidzenko, Sergei Krikalev, and William Shepherd cut the ceremonial cake. Right: MACE experiment aboard STS-67 — the precursor to the MACE-II experiment for Expedition 1. Credits: NASA

On Aug. 4, 2000, Shepherd, Gidzenko, and Krikalev participated in the traditional cake-cutting ceremony in the Space Station Training Facility at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. The event symbolized the completion of their training program in the United States.

One of their last training sessions included a safety briefing on the Middeck Active Control Experiment-II (MACE-II), which would be delivered to station aboard the STS-106 mission in September. MACE-II, a follow-on from the first MACE investigation conducted aboard STS-67 in 1995, became the first active NASA science experiment aboard the space station. Funded by NASA’s Langley Research Center and developed at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the experiment sought to demonstrate active structural control to improve spacecraft stability.

The Expedition 1 crew departed Houston on Aug. 10 and arrived in Moscow the next day to complete their training program at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City and, ultimately, at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan prior to their launch on Oct. 31.

Left: Launch of a Progress cargo resupply vehicle. Middle: View of a Progress vehicle approaching station. Right: The two latest additions to ISS as seen from STS-106: the Zvezda Service Module (middle) and the Progress M1-3 cargo resupply vehicle (at right). Credits: NASA

A Soyuz rocket took off from Baikonur on Aug. 6 carrying the Progress M1-3 uncrewed cargo resupply vehicle. The liftoff marked the 400th launch from Baikonur’s Site 1, also known as Gagarin Start ever since the first man in space, Yuri A. Gagarin, launched from that pad on April 12, 1961. Progress M1-3 completed an automatic docking at Zvezda’s aft port two days after launch, delivering about 1.5 tons of propellant for refueling the Zvezda module and 1,355 pounds of equipment to outfit the station in preparation for the Expedition 1 crew’s arrival. The addition of Progress M1-3 raised the mass of station to about 60 tons. The vehicle began refueling Zvezda a few days after arrival and remained attached to ISS so the STS-106 crew members could offload its cargo in September. It departed station on Nov. 1 to free the docking port for the Expedition 1 crew, who arrived aboard their Soyuz TM31 spacecraft the next day.

Left: Workers transfer Space Shuttle Atlantis from the OPF to the VAB in preparation for the STS-106 mission. Right: Space Shuttle Atlantis rolls out to Launch Pad 39B. Credits: NASA

Following its return on May 29 from the STS-101 mission to the space station, workers in the Orbiter Processing Facility (OPF) at Kennedy began the work to turn Space Shuttle Atlantis around for STS-106, scheduled for early September. Among the significant activities, they removed and replaced the three main engines and the Spacehab module from the payload bay. On Aug. 7, they towed it to the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) for mating with the external tank and solid rocket boosters four days later — the same day the Spacehab module arrived at Launch Pad 39B. The shuttle stack followed on Aug. 13. 

During their 11-day flight, the seven-member STS-106 crew comprising five American astronauts and two Russian cosmonauts outfitted Zvezda with equipment brought up on the shuttle, as well as aboard Progress M1-3 to prepare it for the arrival of the Expedition 1 crew in early November. Two of the crew members conducted a spacewalk to connect electrical, communications, and telemetry cables between the Zvezda and Zarya modules.

To be continued …