ISS Crew Transitions to Expedition 56/57 with Arrival of 61st Woman in Space

The International Space Station (ISS) Expedition 55/56 members Scott Tingle, Anton Shkaplerov, and Norishige Kanai are set to return to Earth June 3 in a parachute-assisted landing aboard Soyuz MS-07 spacecraft which will undock from the Rassvet module. Roscosmos is scheduled to launch Soyuz MS-09 rocket June 6 from Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan on a 2-day journey carrying 3 members of Expedition 56/57 to ISS. Alexander Gerst of ESA, Sergey Prokopyev of Roscosmos, and Serena Auñón-Chancellor of NASA are expected to join Drew Feustel, Ricky Arnold, and Oleg Artemyev to complete the 6-person crew, and are scheduled to return to Earth in December. Exp. 56 will conduct experiments and gather data on alloy sintering, plant growth, atomization simulations, gaseous trials for combustion and diffusion, and various effects of microgravity on humans. Maintenance aboard ISS includes upcoming EVAs scheduled for June 14 and August 8, and preparation for cargo ship arrivals in June, July and August. There have been 556 people in space, including 60 women. Flight surgeon Serena Auñón-Chancellor is scheduled to become the 61st woman in space, followed by Anne McClain scheduled for December 20 and Christina Hammock planned for April 2019. Ongoing “First Woman on the Moon Will Be From Where?” poll from Space Age Publishing Company and international groups continue to advocate and support women and diversity in space. (Image Credit: NASA, ESA, Roscosmos)

MONDAY

Solar System Ambassadors, CanSat and Base 11 Competitions Advancing 21st Century Education

A wide-range of space education events are launching this week, including 11 hosted by NASA Solar System Ambassadors Program volunteers who share latest discoveries with communities. On June 5, Willie Yee will talk about ‘NASA Space Exploration Missions for 2018’ and Kenneth Bailey on ‘LRO / LCROSS’ at Elting Memorial Library in New York. Amaya Davis is exploring ‘Why Mars? Overview of Mars Exploration and the InSight Mission’ at American Women’s Club of Seville, Spain on June 6. Mark Johnston will discuss ‘Space Exploration: Past and Future’ at Grand Canyon North Rim Visitor Center June 10. There are also Ambassador events focused on Hubble telescope, Astronomy, weather balloons, and to the Moon & beyond. New Worlds Institute is hosting a Meetup June 5 in Austin, Texas with Wells Person to update on York Space Systems. American Astronautical Society Student CanSat Competition is being held June 8-10 in Stephenville, Texas. The 2018 competition challenges 40 international student teams to build a space-type system to simulate a space probe entering a planetary atmosphere. It must launch and safely return an egg to 670-725 meters. Base 11, founded 2009, is announcing June 6 its US$1 Million+ Space Challenge for a student-led university team to design, build and launch a liquid-propelled, single-stage rocket to 100 km (SSTO) by December 30, 2021 – a feat that has not yet been accomplished from Earth. (Image Credit: AAS, NASA, Lockheed Martin, Base 11, Reaction Engines Limited, et al)

Jun 4 — New Horizons,

Jun 4— SpaceX, Falcon 9 / SES 12, KSC FL: SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket to launch SES 12 communications satellite for SES of Luxembourg.

Jun 4 — Greenville County Library – Hughes Main Library, Greenville SC: To the Moon and Beyond; family event about the Moon followed briefly about the solar system, led by David Leaphart of NASA Solar System Ambassador Program.

Jun 4-5 — Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy NY: 1st Annual RPI Workshop on Image-Based Modeling and Navigation for Space Applications.

Jun 4-8 — Flatiron Institute, NYU, Harvard, NYC NY: 2018 New York City Gaia Sprints; bringing together people who have an interest in timely scientific investigation and use of Gaia Data.

Jun 4-8 — NASA Astrobiology Institute, Georgia Institute of Technology, ELSI Origins Network, Atlanta GA: Astrobiology Graduate Conference (AbGradCon).

Jun 4-15 — Mainz Institute for Theoretical Physics, Johannes Gutenberg University, Mainz, Germany: Program: The Sound of Spacetime – The Dawn of Gravitational Wave Science.

Continued from…

May 29 – Aug 3 — Lunar and Planetary Society, NASA SSERVI, Center for Lunar Science and Exploration, Houston TX: 2018 Exploration Science Summer Intern Program; students to be involved in activities that support missions to the Moon that utilize Orion crew vehicle, Deep Space Gateway, and robotic assets on lunar surface.

Jun 3-8 — Asia Oceania Geosciences Society (AOGS), Honolulu HI: Asia Oceania Geosciences Society (AOGS) 15th Annual Meeting.