Expedition 59 Crew Launch On Soyuz MS-12 Increases ISS Complement to 6

Soyuz MS-12 flight scheduled for Mar 14 will carry ISS Expedition 59 crew of Aleksey Ovchinin, Christina Koch, and Nick Hague. Ovchinin and Hague are the former crew of MS-10 from Oct 2018. Rookie astronaut Koch will be the 63rd woman in space. The Expedition 58 crew of Anne McClain, Oleg Kononenko and David Saint-Jacques are aboard ISS after arrival on Soyuz MS-11 on Dec 3, 2018 and will become part of Expedition 59. Saint-Jacques is the first Canada astronaut following Chris Hadfield, commander of Expedition 35, in 2013. SpaceX Crew Dragon DM-1 departs ISS on Mar 8. SpaceX DM-2 is on track to return astronauts to ISS aboard an American vehicle in July, followed closely by the Boeing Starliner. An American flag left on ISS by the crew of the final Space Shuttle mission STS-135 in 2011 waits for the first commercial crew. McClain is resizing spacesuit components for 3 EVAs planned in Mar and Apr. On Mar 29 McClain and Koch will make the first all-female EVA. Kononenko replaces fuel bottles used during experiments in the Combustion Integrated Rack. Flight of the first United Arab Emirates astronaut, formerly scheduled for MS-12, is delayed to MS-15. Two UAE candidates are currently training in Russia to join ISS. (Image Credits: NASA, Boeing)

MONDAY

Moon, ISRU, NewSpace Conferences Draw Prominent Speakers, Enterprises to Italy, Massachusetts, Texas

Another lunar-focused week begins March 11 with “Mining the Moon for Profit: A Case Study in Space Resource Utilization” hosted by Secure World Foundation, SEE Lab and GWU Space Policy Institute in Milan, Italy. The invitation-only event participants include (L-R) Simonetta di Pippo (UNOOSA), Ian Crawford (Univ. of London), Eleonora Ammannito (ASI), Andrew Aldrin (Aldrin Space Institute), Bernard Foing (ESA), Dan Hendrickson (Astrobotic), Giuseppe Reibaldi (MVA), Lynn Zoenen (iSpace Japan), and Vittorio Bombelli (PT Scientists). In Cambridge MA, MIT Space Week on March 13-15 will see three major events: Apollo 50 + 50, Beyond the Cradle 2019 “Envisioning a New Space Age“, and New Space Age Conference. It will commemorate 50th year of Apollo 11, look to the next 50 years and highlight technologies, tools, astropreneurship, spacecraft, and human experiences while humanity is on the cusp of becoming an interplanetary civilization. Some of the many panel discussions and presentations will feature Apollo, Shuttle, and ISS Astronauts, engineers, and scientists: Maria Zuber, Loretta Whitesides, Sara Seager, Thomas Zurbuchen, Charles Bolden, Jeffrey Hoffman, Cady Coleman, Walter Cunningham, and Charlie Duke. On the eve of 50th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference, Brown University, Vernadsky and IKI are hosting Microsymposium 60 with theme Forward to the Moon to Stay: Undertaking Transformative Lunar Science with Commercial Partners on March 16-17 at Woodlands TX. (Image Credits: MIT, SWF, NASA, ME, ILOA, SSERVI, Golden Spike Co., Astrobotic, UNOOSA, Bigelow Aerospace)

Mar 11 — International Planetarium Society Inc., Multiple Locations: International Day of Planetaria; promote knowledge of planetaria to the public.

Mar 11-13 — American Astronomical Society, Washington DC: AAS Congressional Visits Day 2019.

Mar 11 — Moon: 5.5° SSE of Mars, 07:00.

Mar 11 — Apollo Asteroid 2019 DH: Near-Earth Flyby (0.020 AU)

Mar 11 — Apollo Asteroid 2019 CM4: Near-Earth Flyby (0.035 AU)

Continued from…

Jan 2019 – Sep 2020 — New Horizons, Kuiper Belt: Full data from spacecraft 7 instruments during KBO Ultima Thule flyby to be transmitted to Earth over this time period.

Mar 8-17 — South by Southwest, Austin TX: SXSW Conference and Festival; celebrating the convergence of tech, interactive, film, and music industries.

Mar 9-15 — International Union of Radio Science (URSI), New Delhi, India: 2019 URSI Asia-Pacific Radio Science Conference.

Mar 9-20 — Committee on Space Research (COSPAR), Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) ESA, ISRO, NASA, IAU, Punjab, India: COSPAR Capacity Building Workshop: Broadband Spectral and Timing Studies with Astrosat, Chandra and XMM-Newton.

Mar 9-23 — Atlanta Science Festival, Delta Air Lines, et al, Atlanta GA: Atlanta Science Festival 2019; features Astronaut Job Fair.

TUESDAY

Mar 12 — JAXA, Tokyo, Japan: International Space Exploration Symposium 2019; Towards Sustainable Space Exploration:Science, Industry and Society-A New Era of Joint Growth.