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This Space Station page is intended to keep readers up to date on the latest schedules and news about the international space station. No attempt is made to duplicate data found on NASA pages or from other news sources; the goal here is to post information not normally carried by other media outlets. See the Current Mission page for additional details about the next station assembly flight, STS-98. As always, comments, suggestions and corrections are welcome!
Changes and additions (reload page for latest update!):
Editor's Note...
The following story also is posted on the Spaceflight Now web site.
Despite a relentless work schedule, the Alpha astronauts say life on board the international space station is improving and while they miss the comforts of home, all three crew members say they would be happy to extend their stay if necessary.
But some problems remain, including high noise levels from the station's air conditioning system and poor communications with the ground.
"The biggest problem we have had is communications," commander William Shepherd told an interviewer today. "Our pipe to the ground has been kind of narrow and not that reliable. And that really impedes both sides - the crew on board and the teams on the ground - from talking as we need to work things out. We have got to have more communications and they have to be better."
Shepherd and his two cosmonaut crewmates - Sergei Krikalev and Yuri Gidzenko - currently communicate with Russian ground stations when flying within line of sight. They also can use an S-band radio link through NASA's Tracking and Data Relay System satellites.
But communications can be sporadic at best and television from the station is restricted to laptop videoconferencing.
A high-speed Ku-band communications link will be established later this year, after attachment of the U.S. laboratory module, Destiny, next month and installation of additional gear in early March.
In the meantime, life aboard the station is "very much like the Russian Mir space station," Shepherd said. "For me, it's pretty much like being on a ship or submarine. It's probably a little bit better.
"We certainly have more room than what I'm used to on the shuttle, and that's quite a change. It is cramped, but the space is pretty well laid out and it's very liveable."
The crew keeps in touch with family and friends via email "and we have a ham radio on board and we can talk to friends and families that way," Shepherd said. "We have scheduled conferences about every week with folks on the ground, particularly spouses and friends. It's certainly adequate."
But the station is a fairly noisy place to live and work, primarily due to the vehicle's air conditioning system, prompting the crew to wear earplugs or earphones at night.
"It's probably a little bit more (noisy) than we would like, (but) it's better than when we started," Shepherd said. "I'd like to see the noise level come down, but we're certainly in an environment right now that we think we can stay in effectively for some period of time.
"Yuri spends a lot of time (near one of the air conditioning units) because that's where his personal computer is. He's wearing earphones a lot. We're all wearing them at night because the machinery here makes some intermittent clicks and clacks as it cycles around. We sleep a little better with our earplugs in."
Shepherd said he has been most surprised by "how normal it gets to feel" living aboard the space station.
"You don't have really much sense that you are in space physically except for the fact that everything's floating around," he said. "The food's good, the water's good, the air is good. We're getting plenty of exercise and my feeling is we could probably keep doing this for a while. That is what was surprising to me."
The crew's intense work schedule has gotten quite a bit of attention in the media. Shepherd said the workload reamins high, but the crew and ground controllers have lowered their expectations and the pace has settled down to a more realistic level.
"The schedule started out very ambitious, there were a lot of expectations about how things were going to go," Shepherd said. "Some of those were not very good. But planning and how the pieces have been put together are definitely getting better. The good news is for the guys and gals who follow us, it will be better."
But it has been frustrating nonetheless.
"For me, the most frustrating thing has been to try and do our best to people's expectations on the ground," he said. "Everybody wants to get things done with every good intent but sometimes we just can't make it happen the way that we foresaw before we launched. That's been the most frustrating thing."
Even so, he said the crew is trying its best to avoid arguments with ground controllers to make sure an "us-versus-them" attitude does not develop.
"That's easily a natural part of the environment and we're trying to preclude starting a food fight, if you will," Shepherd said. "We're trying to exercise patience with the ground, we know there are a lot of things that maybe could go better.
"But we try not to be too critical because in the long run, all that won't matter. What matters is we have people up in space, space station is working and we're making progress building the station. And that's what's important."
Working through their 84th day aboard the station, all three crew members said they are getting along well in space and have no problems living together in such tight quarters.
"I think we're getting to know each other better and better as a crew," Shepherd said. "We're getting along really well, we're working as a team. We've had a lot of practice, we had four years before we got up here to work on it. Actually, if they sent us some more fuel, we'll keep this thing going for a while, I think we're doing well."
"I completely agree with that," Krikalev added.
Shepherd and his crewmates originally expected to return to Earth in late February. But their stay aboard the station has been extended to mid March because of delays getting the shuttle Atlantis off the ground on the Destiny installation mission.
And what if additional delays are ordered?
"I think you have to approach it from the standpoint of you get home when you get home," Shepherd said today. "Yuri and I are military folks and we've been in this kind of arrangement for some time. Sergei has got a lot of experience flying in space (and) he's probably the expert on flight delays, having done two increments back-to-back on the Mir.
"So I think it's something we have been conditioned to. We don't expect big delays, but certainly we're mentally prepared to deal with it."
Editor's Note...
The following story also is posted on the Spaceflight Now web site.
Cosmonaut Yuri Gidzenko remotely piloted an unmanned Progress supply ship to a trouble-free manual redocking with the international space station today as the two spacecraft sailed 230 miles above Mongolia.
The Progress M1-4 vehicle's recently upgraded automatic guidance system successfully brought the vehicle to a point just under 200 meters from the station about a half hour before the planned docking.
Then, at 5:54 a.m. EST (1054 GMT), Gidzenko, using a video monitor and a joystick hand controller in the Zvezda command module, switched to manual mode as planned and began the craft's final approach to an Earth-facing port on the station's Zarya module.
"Control system is fine Yuri?" Russian ground controllers asked.
"Yes, it is fine," Gidzenko replied.
"Are you trying to center it?"
"Yes, that's what I'm trying to do, and i'm damping the angular velocity."
"Copy."
"And I can see through the window that the movement is steady and very smooth," flight engineer Sergei Krikalev reported.
A few moments later, a target on Zarya's nadir port came into view and Gidzenko reported: "I can see the target... I see the cross on the target, so everything is fine."
"What about the range?"
"It's about 30 meters."
Television views from the Progress - the same scenes Gidzenko was using to remotely fly the craft as if he was on board - were carried live on NASA television.
Unlike the blurry video downlinked during the vehicle's initial docking attempt on Nov. 18, the black-and-white picture was crystal clear today, showing the station in stark detail as the Progress approached."
"We have capture and alignment," a station crew member reported at 6:03 a.m. (1103 GMT).
"A perfect docking by Yuri Gidzenko, manually bringing the Progress back to the Zarya nadir docking port for the second time," NASA mission control commentator Rob Navias reported from Houston.
"Good work, guys," Russian flight control called an hour later.
"Thank you," Krikalev replied. "The automatic mode worked quite well."
Shortly after the redocking was complete, NASA television carried a replay of video downlinked from the station earlier showing condensation build ups on internal station components.
While the station's air conditioning system is working, large amounts of water could be seen pooling around various components in the condensate recovery system. It's not yet known whether this is a problem or not, but the sheer volume of water seen in the downlinked video was surprising.
The Progress M1-4 cargo craft was launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan Nov. 16 and docked with the Zarya module's Earth-facing, or nadir, port two days later. The Progress was unloaded and undocked Dec. 1 to make way for arrival of the space shuttle Endeavour the next day.
During the cargo ship's initial approach Nov. 18, its KURS automatic guidance system malfunctioned and Gidzenko was forced to take over manual control using the so-called TORU system to remotely guide the craft to a safe docking.
Russian engineers traced the KURS problem to a glitch in the computer control software that prevented the ship's computer system from smoothly switching from guidance data transmitted by antennas on the Zvezda module to signals transmitted from Zarya.
A software patch was uplinked to the Progress earlier this month to correct that problem. Testing that patch to make sure future Progress vehicles can safely dock with the station was the primary objective of today's redocking.
But the KURS system could only bring the Progress M1-4 vehicle to a point 200 meters or so from the station. A KURS antenna needed for the final push to docking was retracted during the initial approach and it was not designed to be re-extended.
As a result, Gidzenko once again had to take over manual control using the TORU system in the Zvezda module.
The TORU system has no backup and NASA managers initially opposed the redocking. But Russian engineers demonstrated at least three abort modes, any one of which would prevent any chance of a collision even if the TORU system malfunctioned.
In the end, NASA managers went along with the Russian proposal to redock the Progress.
Editor's Note...
The following story also is posted on the Spaceflight Now web site.
NASA's mission management team today formally approved a Russian proposal to redock the Progress M1-4 cargo vehicle to the international space station on Dec. 26.
The primary goal of the maneuver is to test a software patch designed to correct an automatic guidance system problem that forced cosmonaut Yuri Gidzenko to take over manual control during the craft's initial docking Nov. 18.
"We had some problems with the automated docking when Progress came the first time," station flight engineer Sergei Krikalev told a reporter today. "We were able to dock it manually and Yuri did a good job flying it in manual mode.
"People on the ground think they have found the problem, they have fixed it and they want to be sure this problem is fixed and they want to make another attempt with this Progress to be sure the software is correct for the next flight."
The Progress M1-4 spacecraft was undocked from the Zarya module's Earth-facing port Dec. 1 to make room for the shuttle Endeavour, which docked to a nearby port on the U.S. Unity module the next day.
The Progress, meanwhile, was "parked" several hundred miles ahead of the station in the same orbit while U.S. and Russian ground controllers assessed redocking options.
The Russians want to test the guidance system software patch and to give the crew additional trash stowage volume.
NASA managers initially opposed a redocking because final approach would have to be carried out manually by Gidzenko using the station's TORU system. The TORU system is made up of a television monitor and a joystick controller that allow an approaching Progress to be remotely piloted from inside the Zvezda command module.
The presumably repaired KURS automatic guidance system can still maneuver the craft to a point about 600 feet from the station. But a fully automated redocking is not possible because an antenna used for final approach was retracted during the initial docking and it cannot be re-extended.
But NASA's mission management team today approved a manual redocking based on assurances from the Russians that final approach could be aborted in the event of a TORU malfunction.
"The system has a lot of built-in ways to protect us from something bad happening," commander William Shepherd said today during an interview. "Yuri's not about to do anything imprudent. He did a good job of docking before. As long as we have reasonable control and a good picture, I think we'll be successful. I'm not worried about it."
The approved plan calls for the KURS automatic guidance system to move the craft to its station-keeping point 600 feet from the station early Dec. 26.
Gidzenko then will take over manual control using the TORU system, remotely piloting the craft to a docking with the Zarya module's downward-facing nadir port around 6 a.m. EST (1100 GMT). The docking will be carried live on NASA television.
Looking ahead to Christmas, Shepherd said the station crew plans to spend a bit of time enjoying the view from 230 miles up and to share a turkey dinner. They also will open presents from friends and family members that were ferried up aboard the shuttle Endeavour earlier this month.
Shepherd said the crew has resisted the temptation to open any presents early, but he admitted to shaking a few to get a feel for what might be inside.
Krikalev, a veteran of the Mir space station, said the now-abandoned Russian outpost was equipped with a small Christmas tree that cosmonauts would decorate for the holidays.
No such tree is aboard the international space station. Yet.
"Unfortunately, this is the first expedition and next year, we'll have a Christmas tree here," he said.
Asked about the health of the station's Vozdukh carbon dioxide removal system, Shepherd said he is confident his crew could make repairs even if the system fails again.
Last week, station flight director Jeff Hanley said the crew was one failure away from a potential evacuation after two earlier failures of the Vozdukh's microcompressor fan assembly.
"We're a pretty resourceful bunch up here," Shepherd said. "I'm pretty convinced if we had more serious failures, we could probably go fix the hardware on board.
"We're pretty good tearing into things and figuring out what we need up here. The ground sometimes is kind of reluctant to let us do that. But I think it's kind of the way of the future.
"People on spacecraft like this a long way from home have got to be more and more able to fix things themselves," Shepherd said. "And that's kind of the mode we're pointing at right now."
Finally, Shepherd was asked how the crew felt about recent delays in the shuttle flight scheduled to return them to Earth. That flight, originally scheduled for launch Feb. 15, has slipped to around March 1 because of technical problems.
"I think all of us took off on this mission with the thinking it was going to be over when it was over and as long as we get home sometime in the spring, we'll be happy with that," Shepherd said.
"If you look back at the people who did the initial exploration hundreds of years ago, some of those people lived on ships for years traveling the globe and didn't even get off. So I think the comparison, having to be on space station for an extra couple of weeks, is a pretty minor thing."
The Progress M1-4 supply ship was undocked from the international space station today to make way for arrival of the shuttle Endeavour around 2:57 p.m. Saturday. The Progress vehicle was launched Nov. 16 and docked with the Zarya module's downward-facing, or nadir, port two days later. The station's on-board crew unloaded the spacecraft over the past two weeks.The Progress was undocked at 11:23 a.m. today. A few seconds later a rocket firing was carried out to drop the craft about a mile below the station. At that altitude, it will pull ahead about six miles per orbit, according to NASA's mission control commentator.
Russian engineers are assessing the feasibility of redocking the craft early next year to provide additional trash stowage volume for the station's crew. But this is a thorny issue for NASA managers and it's not yet clear how it will play out.
The Progress is designed to carry out an automated docking with the space station. As a backup, a pilot on board the station can take over manual control using a joystick hand controller and a video monitor that shows the view a pilot would see if he or she was on board the Progress. During final approach Nov. 18, the automatic guidance system failed, apparently because of a software error, and cosmonaut Yuri Gidzenko had to take over for a manual docking.
Russian engineers believe they understand what went wrong with the automatic guidance system and they believe it would be safe to carry out a redocking next year. But that redocking apparently would have to be carried by Gidzenko. NASA officials say an antenna used by the automatic rendezvous system retracted during the initial docking attempt and it was not designed to be re-extended.
NASA managers are against another manual docking because that system has no backup. Should Gidzenko's controls fail, the Progress could fly out of control and possibly hit the station. Russian engineers apparently feel it's safe to proceed. They want to test the software reconfiguration and say they could always abort the approach if something went wrong.
While engineers assess the issue, the Progress M1-4 vehicle will remain in a parking orbit well away from the station.
Editor's Note...
The following story also is posted on the Spaceflight Now web site.
Improving communications between U.S. and Russian flight controllers remains a major challenge for the international space station team as both sides struggle to iron out differences in operational philosophy.
Not to mention coping with a language barrier and the physical distance - 9,000 miles and nine time zones - between the U.S. and Russian flight control centers.
Case in point: A recent, seemingly unilateral decision by Russian controllers to park an unloaded Progress resupply ship in orbit for a possible redocking early next year, a move NASA managers had said would not be considered because of safety issues.
The Progress M1-4 spacecraft docked to the station Nov. 18. Cosmonaut Yuri Gidzenko, using a television camera and a joystick in the Russian Zvezda module, manually guided the supply ship to a linkup after the supply ship's automatic navigation system failed.
The Progress must be undocked from the Zarya module's downward facing port Dec. 1 to make way for arrival of the shuttle Endeavour the next day. Endeavour, scheduled for launch Thursday evening, will dock with a downward-facing port on the U.S. Unity module.
The Russians originally planned to deorbit the Progress immediately after undocking, but they now plan to place it in a parking orbit instead while engineers assess the possibility of redocking it early next year to give the station crew more volume for trash storage.
NASA managers had said repeatedly that a redocking was out of the question because of the problem with the automatic guidance system and the lack of a backup for the manual system used by Gidzenko.
They clearly were caught off guard when the Russians unexpectedly told the station crew the new plan was under consideration.
Today, astronaut Robert Cabana, a senior station manager, said the redocking will only occur if an engineering analysis shows it is, in fact, safe to proceed.
Russian engineers believe the vehicle's initial docking problems were caused by a software problem in the automatic guidance system. That problem apparently can be corrected.
That's the technical side of the story. From a management perspective, improving communications between both control centers to make sure everyone is on the same page is paramount to U.S. managers.
"When you consider what we did, the number of flights it took to stow all that equipment up there, put the station together and then throw an international crew on it and work between the two control centers, I think things are going amazingly well," Cabana said.
"The thing that we've learned most is better communications with our Russian colleagues. The team is working much better in the control center. And we knew it was going to take getting the crew up there and working on these issues to resolve a lot of them. It's difficult to plan everything out perfectly.
"I think the realtime ops are going extremely well," he said. "We sill need to improve our planning process a little bit and the communications between our control centers in the day to day planning of the flight."
Station commander William Shepherd agreed, telling a reporter today "things are not perfect, but they're going pretty smooth compared to where we started seven or eight years ago on this program. It's still a challenge, it's probably one of the bigger ones we've got, but I think our progress has been pretty exceptional."
He said engineers and managers on both sides have "different expectations about how it's all going to work."
"The biggest challenge is to try and make that be a reality and meet everybody's desires and wishes as to how it's going to come together," he said. "Quite often, people in Houston or in Moscow want to do things differently and finding some common ground where everybody's going to be at least satisfied has been a real challenge."
In the meantime, NASA is pressing ahead with a steady stream of station assembly flights and all systems are "go" for Endeavour's launching Thursday night to deliver a $600 million set of solar arrays to the orbital outpost.
In January, NASA plans to launch the U.S. laboratory module, Destiny, followed by a crew rotation/logistics mission in February, additional supplies in April and the joint airlock module in May.
"If you sit back and look at it, these are really exciting and challenging times for each of us," said shuttle program manager Ronald Dittemore. "The complexity of the flights continues to increase as station assembly progresses.
"STS-97 may be the 101st space shuttle mission, but it is still a mission that will be full of space firsts, as will every space station flight," he said. "The crew will attach the heaviest, largest and most complex piece of station hardware launched so far. Once deployed, the wingspan of the solar arrays will be twice the length of the shuttle, making the station the third brightest star and from our point of view, the most beautiful."
Said Cabana: "I think this is an extremely exciting mission and I can't wait to see those solar arrays deploy. If this flight goes as well as our last one did, I think we're going to show we really know what we're doing and we're going to have great success in the years ahead."
Space station assembly flight 4A - shuttle mission STS-97 - is scheduled for launch Nov. 30 from the Kennedy Space Center. A detailed mission overview is posted on the Current Mission page. Space station updates will be posted here as warranted, but readers should check out the Current Mission page first to get the latest on station operations.Earlier space station status reports, including an Expedition One overview, coverage of the first crew's launch and the arrival of a Progress supply ship are archived below in the CBS News Reporter's Notebook.
Editor's Note...
The following mission/ground processing status reports are from NASA's shuttle/station web page or the Kennedy Space Center status report archive. They are edited as warranted.
Space Station Status Report #63
December 26, 2000 - 08:00 a.m. EST
More than three weeks after it was undocked and placed in a parking orbit, an unmanned Russian Progress resupply vehicle was manually redocked to the International Space Station (ISS) this morning to be used as a trash receptacle and a fuel farm by the Expedition One crew.
Operating from a control panel in the ISS' Zvezda command center, Pilot Yuri Gidzenko guided the 7 ½ ton Progress in for a smooth linkup to the Zarya module's nadir, or downward facing docking port at 5:03 a.m. Central time (1103 GMT) as the two craft flew over northwest Mongolia, just south of the Russian-Mongolian border.
The Progress, which was first launched on November 16 and manually docked by Gidzenko on November 18 after a failure of the ship's automatic Kurs guidance system, was undocked on December 1 and placed in a parking orbit to enable Russian flight controllers to correct a software glitch which prevented its automatic docking.
With Commander Bill Shepherd and Flight Engineer Sergei Krikalev looking on, Gidzenko deftly maneuvered the Progress in for its redocking from a distance of just under 200 meters, offering the crew a place in which to stow trash and have residual fuel available for any maneuvers which may be required prior to its final undocking the day after the launch of the Shuttle Atlantis next month on the STS-98 mission to bring the U.S. Laboratory Destiny to the ISS.
Within two hours after the redocking, Krikalev equalized pressure between the Progress and the Zarya and opened hatches between the two vehicles to enable the crewmembers to deactivate the Progress' systems. All ISS systems are functioning in good shape.
The crew will spend the rest of the week unloading ballast from the Progress, removing its Kurs automated docking system for analysis by engineers back on Earth, performing biomedical experiments and reviewing flight plans for the January Shuttle flight to install Destiny to the ISS' Unity module.
Over the weekend, the crew spent a quiet Christmas, talking to their families, opening presents on board and receiving a holiday greeting on Christmas Day from NASA Administrator Daniel Goldin. The three crew members, who are in their 56th day in space and their 54th day aboard the Station, will spend a quiet New Year's weekend, with a light work schedule on tap and additional conferences with their families planned to usher in 2001.
The next written Expedition One status report will be issued on Wednesday, January 3, or sooner, if developments warrant.
SpaceCalc is an Excel 5.0 spreadsheet written for armchair flight controllers, reporters and others interested in tracking a variety of space-related events. The CBS News Space Reporter's Handbook provides detailed information about each upcoming shuttle flight. See the Current Mission page to download.
Space Station Information from NASA
Detailed coverage of space station assembly missions is available below in archived shuttle flight data files.
STS-88 Mission Archive (200K) STS-96 Mission Archive (240K) STS-101 Mission Archive (250K) STS-106 Mission Archive (250K) STS-92 Mission Archive (250K)
See the Statistics Page for additional demographic data or NASA's astronaut bio page. A listing of active cosmonauts is available on Dennis Newkirk's Russian Aerospace Guide. NOTES: Ages as of launch; MS: mission specialist; PS: payload specialist; FE: flight engineer; EV: spacewalker; M/X: Married/single/divorced with X kids
ISS-1............Current status: In orbit Commander........William Shepherd,50; STS-27, 41, 52; M/0; DOB: 07/26/49 Flight engineer..Yuri Gidzenko, 37; Soyuz TM-22; M/2; DOB: 03/26/62 Flight engineer..Sergei Krikalev, 41; Soyuz TM-7, TM-12, STS-60; M/1; DOB: 08/27/58STS-97..........Current status: In training Commander........Navy Cmdr. Brent Jett, 42; STS-72, 81; M/0; DOB: 10/05/58 Pilot............AF Lt. Col. Michael Bloomfield, 41; STS-86; M/2; DOB: 03/16/59 MS1/EV1..........Joseph Tanner, 50; STS-66, 82; M/2; DOB: 01/21/50 MS2/RMS/FE.......Marc Garneau, Ph.D., 51; STS-41G, 77; M/3; DOB: 02/23/49 MS3/EV2..........USMC Lt. Col. Carlos Noriega, 41; STS-84; M/5; DOB: 10/08/59
EST........DD...HH...MM...EVENT
11/15/00
08:33 PM...00...00...00...Launch of Progress M1-4
08:42 PM...00...00...09...Third stage cutoff; Progress separation; solar
array deploy; antenna deploy
11/16/00
12:07 AM...00...03...34...BNS DV1
12:48 AM...00...04...15...BNS DV2
09:31 PM...01...00...58...BNS DV3
11/17/00
06:57 PM...01...22...24...ISS maneuvers to docking orientation
07:08 PM...01...22...35...ISS in docking orientation
07:14 PM...01...22...41...Sunset
07:30 PM...01...22...57...TDRS-E acquisition of signal (AOS)
07:38 PM...01...23...05...AR&D (automatic rendezvous and docking) sequence begins
07:52 PM...01...23...19...Sunset
07:59 PM...01...23...26...AR&D DV4 impulse No. 1
08:08 PM...01...23...35...AR&D Progress EOAN-A activation
08:09 PM...01...23...36...DO1 node
08:21 PM...01...23...48...AR&D impulse No. 2
08:21 PM...01...23...48...First Russian ground station acquisition of signal
08:27 PM...01...23...54...TDRS-E LOS
08:31 PM...01...23...58...TDRS-W AOS
08:27 PM...01...23...54...Sunrise
08:44 PM...02...00...11...Last Russian ground station LOS (USK-35)
08:45 PM...02...00...12...AR&D impulse No. 3
09:09 PM...02...00...36...TDRS-E AOS
09:24 PM...02...00...51...Sunset
09:25 PM...02...00...52...TDRS-W LOW
09:28 PM...02...00...55...AR&D ballistic targeting point (DOA)
09:28 PM...02...00...55...AR&D impulse No. 4
09:35 PM...02...01...02...AR&D impulse No. 5
09:37 PM...02...01...04...AR&D impulse No. 6
09:38 PM...02...01...05...AR&D flyaround mode start
09:41 PM...02...01...08...DO2 node
09:43 PM...02...01...10...TDRS-Z AOS
09:47 PM...02...01...14...AR&D stationkeeping starts
09:57 PM...02...01...24...First ground station AOS (SHK-34)
09:58 PM...02...01...25...AR&D final approach begins
09:59 PM...02...01...26...Sunrise
10:04 PM...02...01...31...TDRS-E LOS
10:07 PM...02...01...34...Progress docks with international space station
10:07 PM...02...01...34...TDRS-W AOS
10:14 PM...02...01...41...Last ground station LOS (USK-35)
10:57 PM...02...02...24...Sunset
See the CBS News Current Mission page for the latest orbital data for the international space station, Mir and the current shuttle mission.
It is difficult to compute a reliable cost estimate for the international space station because of the many variables one could choose to consider. A Government Accounting Office report (T-NSIAD-98-212 Space Station: U.S. Life-Cycle Funding Requirements) earlier this year broke down the U.S. portion of station costs as follows (dollars in billions):
Cost Estimates
As of As of
06/95 04/98
U.S. requirements through assembly complete:
Contract and in-house costs: 1985 through 1993.....11.2....11.2
Development cost from 1994 to assembly complete....17.4....21.9
Subtotal...........................................28.6....33.1
Station-related requirements:
In-house personnel..................................0.9....2.2
Principal investigators.............................0.3....0.2
Shuttle performance enhancements....................0.3....0.2
Russian contract....................................0.4....N/A
Shuttle launch support..............................7.8....17.7
Subtotal...........................................48.2....53.4
U.S. requirements after assembly complete:
Operations/utilization.............................13.0....13.0
Principal investigators.....................Unavailable....0.7
In-house personnel..........................Unavailable....2.9
Shuttle launch support.............................32.7....25.6
Station decommissioning.....................Unavailable....Unavailable
Total.............................................$93.9....$95.6
The NASA cost estimate for development through assembly complete is now around $24 billion. So the above numbers are slightly out of date. But they're in the ballpark and according to those numbers, NASA will spend $35 billion on design and development through assembly complete in 2004. Throwing in the cost of the shuttle missions required to build the station, the cost through assembly complete goes to $55 billion. NASA plans to operate the space station for at least 10 years. Shuttle launch costs and utilization will drive the total price tag, from 1984 through the first 10 years of operation, to nearly $100 billion. This sort of accounting is a bit misleading, because it assumes NASA would not be launching space shuttles in the absence of a space station and thus charges the cost of shuttle operations against the station project.Here is the breakdown for the other station partners:
Canada (mobile space crane)................................1.0 Japan (Japanese Experiment Module).........................2.6 European Space Agency (Columbus research module)...........5.0 European Space Agency (operations through 10 years)........3.5 Russian Space Agency...................................Unknown Total......................................................$12.1
In an effort to keep this page relatively compact, back issues of CBS News space station status reports will be moved to a text archive available via FTP. If you're looking for a quote or need to check when something happened, please check out the archive.