10 years after the first expeditionary crew arrived at the International Space Station (ISS), the latest mission to the orbiting outpost has blasted off from Baikonur cosmodrome. On board the Soyuz TMA-20 spacecraft are ESA astronaut Paolo Nespoli, Russian Dmitri Kondratyev and NASA astronaut Catherine Coleman. Their cruise to the Station will include 35 orbits around the Earth and three major engine burns. The automatic docking with the ISS is planned for the evening of Friday, 17 December.
During his six-month mission, Paolo will serve as a flight engineer for Expeditions 26 and 27. In addition to his flight engineer duties, he will perform more than 30 experiments for European, US, Canadian and Japanese scientists. He will also take part in the docking of two unmanned cargo craft. Europe’s second Automated Transfer Vehicle, Johannes Kepler, and Japan’s second HTV ferry are expected to resupply the ISS in February 2011.
The MagISStra mission is Europe’s third long-duration mission to the ISS. (The name MagISStra, combines the ISS with the Latin word ‘magistra’ – a female teacher.) As the name suggests, education is an important part of Paolo’s activities. There will be two main projects. The ‘Mission X: Train Like an Astronaut’ programme is built around health, well-being and nutrition. ‘Greenhouse in Space’ involves growing plants on the ISS while schoolchildren experiment with a similar greenhouse and the same type of plant on the ground.
Paolo will also use a special camera to make 3-D films of life on board the ISS. Some of these will be posted at twitter.com/astro_paolo and on ESA’s YouTube channel.
