Two
astronauts and the world's first female space tourist are set to cast off from
the International
Space Station (ISS) today and return to Earth.
ISS
Expedition 13 commander Pavel Vinogradov,
flight engineer Jeffrey
Williams and U.S. entrepreneur Anousheh
Ansari will undock from the orbital laboratory at about 5:54 p.m.
EDT (2154 GMT) and descend back to Earth aboard their Soyuz
TMA-8 spacecraft.
NASA will provide live landing coverage for U.S. entrepreneur Anousheh Ansari and the Expedition 13 crew beginning at 2:15 p.m EDT. Click here. |
"Pasha, I
can't believe that it's coming to an end and tomorrow we're going home,"
Williams told Vinogradov Wednesday as the astronauts handed control of the
space station to their Expedition
14 replacements.
Vinogradov
and Williams are completing a six-month mission aboard the ISS that began with
a late March launch and an April 1 arrival to the orbital laboratory. The
astronauts will land in Kazakhstan at 9:10 p.m. EDT (0110 Sept. 29 GMT).
"I am ready
to go home," Williams told the Houston Chronicle this week. "I am ready
to endure what I need to endure physically to get there."
Ansari,
meanwhile, is marking the end of a nine-day
orbital trek and arrived
at the ISS with Expedition 14 commander Michael
Lopez-Alegria and flight engineer Mikhail
Tyurin on Sept. 20.
"Being able
to share this with all of you have made this trip very special for me," Ansari
told her supporters in a video message posted to her blog. "All your words of inspiration and
support for me have inspired me to continue my journey and do more to be part
of making a change in the world...to make our Earth a better place to live."
A long-time
supporter of private human spaceflight, Ansari was originally a backup for
Japanese space tourist Daisuke
Enomoto, who was paying an estimated $20 million for an ISS trip under an
agreement between Russia's Federal Space Agency and the Virginia-based firm Space Adventures.
Ansari took
Enomoto's place after he failed
a preflight medical check, and documented her spaceflight via an Internet blog where she discussed the
joys, wonders and - admittedly - some discomforts of orbital living.
"The most
interesting experience - or should I call it experiment - is washing your hair,"
Ansari wrote in one blog entry before describing a complicated process of
making a large water bubble over her head and using dry shampoo. "Now I know why
people keep their hair short in space."
Lopez-Alegria
said that Ansari's dedication and commitment to her mission, which includes several
biomedical experiments for the European Space Agency (ESA) and stoking
interest in human spaceflight via her website has changed his previously
negative view of space tourism. More than 10 million people have visited
Ansari's blog during her spaceflight, he added.
The
Expedition 14 crew - which also includes European
Space Agency astronaut Thomas Reiter, who joined the Expedition 13 mission
in mid-stride - inherited a larger station from Vinogradov and Williams, who
saw the station host two
NASA shuttles, gain
a third crewmember and receive
a new pair of trusses and solar wings during their spaceflight.
"Pretty
much from the moment I got aboard I loved it," Lopez-Alegria told CBS News
of the ISS in a space-to-ground video link. "It's kind of like you maybe
inherited something and you get to look into all the little nooks and crannies
in the closets and find all the neat stuff in there."
Space
Adventures officials said Ansari's flight has gone amazingly well, and helped
define how the unique situation of backup private spaceflyers are approached in
the future.
"The flight
has been fantastic," Eric Anderson, Space Adventures CEO, told SPACE.com.
"We're very happy to have flown the first [private woman explorer] and she'll
be an excellent communicator, an excellent ambassador."
Anderson said Ansari's husband
Hamid will accompany the recovery helicopter crews that will meet the
private spaceflyer and Expedition 13 astronauts after their Soyuz lands on the Kazakhstan steppes.
"He will be
able to go through and be with the medical teams when they arrive," Anderson said.
"I think
Anousheh is having a great time since we arrived at this station,"
Lopez-Alegria told CNN Español this week. "She has not stopped smiling
and I don't think she wants to go back to Earth."
NASA
TV will broadcast the departure of Ansari and the Expedition 13 astronauts from
the ISS live beginning at 2:15 p.m. EDT (1815 GMT) for crew farewells and hatch
closure. Hatches are scheduled to be shut at 2:45 p.m. EDT (1845 GMT), with
undocking set for 5:54 p.m. EDT (2154 GMT) and landing scheduled for 9:10 p.m.
EDT (0110 Sept. 29 GMT).
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