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Crew Off-Duty Monday Before Week of Research, Cargo Spacecraft Missions

NASA's SpaceX Crew-9 members pose together for a portrait inside the International Space Station's Unity module. From left, are NASA astronaut Suni Williams, Roscosmos cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov, and NASA astronauts Nick Hague and Butch Wimore.
NASA’s SpaceX Crew-9 members pose together for a portrait inside the International Space Station’s Unity module. From left, are NASA astronaut Suni Williams, Roscosmos cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov, and NASA astronauts Nick Hague and Butch Wimore.
NASA

The seven-member Expedition 72 crew relaxed on Monday before beginning a week with a host of advanced space research into robotics, biology, and more at the International Space Station. The orbital residents will also send off a cargo craft after a six-month mission before another resupply ship arrives to replace it this weekend.

The orbital outpost’s four NASA astronauts and three Roscosmos cosmonauts began the workweek with an off-duty day following a weekend of light science duties and housecleaning tasks. The crewmates will go into the rest of the week exploring a variety of science of topics running the gamut of advanced space technology, space agriculture techniques, and how astronauts adapt to long-term weightlessness.

Some of the experiments will include NASA’s station Commander Suni Williams setting up an Astrobee robotic free flyer for a demonstration of its ability to autonomously detect and capture space debris with tentacle-like grippers. NASA Flight Engineer Don Pettit will install space botany hardware for an investigation growing Red Romaine lettuce to learn how to grow crops on future space missions. NASA Flight Engineer Nick Hague will focus his scientific attention on human research this week as he collects his blood and saliva samples for analysis and explores electrical muscle stimulation to supplement space exercise.

NASA Flight Engineer Butch Wilmore is due to spend his week on spacesuits and cargo packing. Wilmore will join Pettit cleaning cooling loops and replacing components on a pair of spacesuits inside the Quest airlock. He will also complete a space physics experiment before packing trash and discarded gear inside Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus space freighter.

Roscosmos cosmonauts Alexey Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner are gearing up for the undocking of the Progress 89 cargo craft from the Zvezda service module planned for 3:17 p.m. EST on Tuesday. The duo finalized packing the Progress 89 for its departure and Ovchinin will be photographing the resupply ship as it backs away from the orbital outpost.

The Progress 91 spacecraft will launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 4:24 p.m. on Thursday before docking to Zvezda’s vacated port 6:03 p.m. on Saturday. Ovchinin and Vagner will be on duty Saturday monitoring the Progress 91’s automated approach and docking.

Roscosmos Flight Engineer Aleksandr Gorbunov spent an hour-and-a-half on Monday attaching electrodes to himself for a 24-hour session monitoring his cardiac activity and blood pressure. He’ll spend the rest of the week on a variety of space biology studies looking at his eyes and digestion system as well as keeping up life support maintenance.

Learn more about station activities by following the space station blog, @space_station and @ISS_Research on X, as well as the ISS Facebook and ISS Instagram accounts.

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