Four
astronauts working to swap control of the International Space Station (ISS)
between their two crews said Thursday that the process is going smoothly as they hit the
midpoint of their work together.
After
nearly six months of spaceflight, Expedition
11 commander Sergei Krikalev and flight engineer John Phillips are now in
their fourth day of handover operations with the station's new crew - Expedition
12 commander Bill McArthur and flight engineer Valery Tokarev.
"There are
no serious problems," Tokarev told SPACE.com from orbit via a communications link, adding that the space
station is in good condition. "Sergei and John worked really hard and did a lot
of work to maintain the station."
Tokarev and
McArthur arrived
at the ISS on Oct. 3 with U.S. space tourist Gregory
Olsen, and will spend about eight days preparing to take the station's reins.
Krikalev and Phillips will return to Earth with Olsen on Oct. 10, though it
will be early Oct. 11 local time in Russia when their Soyuz TMA-6 space capsule
touches down.
Olsen is
paying $20 million for his 10-day spaceflight, during which he will spend a
week aboard the ISS. He is the third fare-paying visitor to the space station
and is conducting three medical experiments
for the European Space Agency, as well as Earth observation.
During
their flight, the Expedition 11 astronauts have repaired the station's primary oxygen
generator and treadmill, watched over a vital gyroscope
replacement and conducted one spacewalk.
"It's going
to be a facility that's going to serve science for many years to come,"
Phillips said of the space station.
As part of
their joint activities, Phillips and McArthur worked earlier today to prepare part
of the station's new Human Research Facility rack - which arrived
aboard the space shuttle Discovery in July - for full science operations.
"I got to
roll up my sleeves just a little bit today," McArthur said of that work, adding
that he looks forward to using the new research station.
Every bit
of new science hardware and space station construction is vital to human exploration
of space, Krikalev said.
"Our [space]
station construction is the biggest technical experiment...where we learn how to
build the space station and how to create something different," Krikalev said. "I
think this experiment is still going, and going well."
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