International Space Station (ISS) Expedition 14 Commander Mike Lopez-Alegria, KE5GTK (photo), and Flight Engineer Mikhail Tyurin, RZ3FT, retracted a stuck antenna on a Progress cargo spacecraft during a more than six-hour spacewalk February 22. The antenna failed to retract last October when the Progress docked to the station's Zvezda Service Module. Moving the antenna was necessary to ensure it wouldn't interfere with the Progress undocking in April. Wearing Russian Orlan spacesuits, the pair completed several other tasks during the spacewalk from the Pirs docking compartment. It marked the fifth such excursion for Expedition 14.

An International Space Station Expedition 14 ARISS school contact has been planned with students at Virginia Run Elementary School in Centreville, Virginia, USA on Friday, 02 Mar. The event is scheduled to begin at approximately 16:18 UTC.

The contact will be a direct between stations NA1SS and K4HTA. The contact should be audible in the Eastern United States and Eastern Canada. Interested parties are invited to listen in on the 145.80 MHz downlink. The participants are expected to conduct the conversation in English.

Located approximately 20 miles west of Washington, D.C. in Centreville, Virginia in Fairfax County, Virginia Run Elementary School provides education to 830 children between the ages of 5 years and 12 years in Kindergarten through sixth grade. Our school is a typical suburban school where the boys and girls often claim that science is their favorite subject.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - NASA decided Tuesday to roll the space shuttle Atlantis off its launch pad and back inside the Vehicle Assembly Building at the Kennedy Space Center. Managers made the decision after a hail storm Monday damaged the orbiter's External Tank. A new target launch date has not been determined, but teams will focus on preparing Atlantis for liftoff in late April.

On Monday, a severe thunderstorm with golf ball-size hail caused what could be 1,000 to 2,000 divots in the giant tank's foam insulation and minor surface damage to about 26 heat shield tiles on the shuttle's left wing. Further evaluation of the tank is necessary to get an accurate accounting of foam damage and must be done in the Vehicle Assembly Building, where the entire tank can be more easily accessed. The shuttle is expected to be moved off the pad by early next week.

Russian delegate Sergey Samburov, RV3DR, took part in a session with flight participant Charles Simonyi, KE7KDP, and provided training on the amateur radio hardware. He has been working on a procedure to restore the Kenwood radio to its proper configuration, which Simonyi will carry out once on board the ISS. Photos of the session may be viewed on the Energia website: http://www.energia.ru/english/energia/iss/iss15/photo_02-21.html

http://www.rac.ca/ariss/oindex.htm

[img]http://www.nasa.gov/images/content/170419main_07pd0549-m.jpg[/img] NASA will host a news conference at no earlier than 4 p.m. EST (2100 UTC), Tuesday, Feb. 27, to discuss the status of the space shuttle's upcoming mission, STS-117. Topics will include the latest on possible impacts to the mission from a hail storm at Kennedy Space Center Monday. The briefing will air live on [url=http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/index.html] NASA TV[/url]. A strong thunderstorm with hail passed through the Kennedy Space Center launch complex area about 5 p.m. EST Monday. The remote cameras indicate some damage to the external tank, but a full assessment on the scene is just getting underway due to the pad being closed for fuel loading.

Expedition 14 Commander Michael Lopez-Alegria and Flight Engineer Mikhail Tyurin performed post-spacewalk cleanup activities Friday. Tasks included returning first-aid kits to their regular stowage locations, recording radiation readings from the spacesuits, closing out and reconfiguring the photo cameras, and downlinking photo imagery from the spacewalk to the ground. Both spacewalkers also tagged up with ground specialists for the standard post-spacewalk debrief.

http://www.amsat.org/amsat/archive/sarex/48hour/msg00368.html

I will be in Orlando the 1st, 2nd and 3rd of March.
Is anybody located around there?

Alain
IFC Staff