Image above: Flight Engineer Greg Chamitoff looks at the Earth from inside the Kibo laboratory. Credit: NASA

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Station crew prepares for shuttle visitors

Expedition 18 Commander Mike Fincke, KE5AIT and flight engineers Yury Lonchakov, RA3DT and Greg Chamitoff, KD5PKZ, are readying the International Space Station for space shuttle Endeavour and the STS-126 crew members. The shuttle is delivering a new station flight engineer, Sandra Magnus, KE5FYE who is replacing Chamitoff.

In the shuttle’s payload bay is a cargo module, the Multi-Purpose Logistics Module, which will carry numerous racks to be transferred to the orbiting laboratory. The racks include life support systems, experiment facilities and crew quarters that will sustain a six-person crew onboard the space station.

Astronaut Sandra H. Magnus, KE5FYE

Endeavour is scheduled to launch Friday, November 14 and arrive at the station two days later. The STS-126 crew will end its mission with a landing at Kennedy Space Center, Florida on November 29.

A Russian Progress 31 unpiloted cargo craft is scheduled to launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan Nov. 26 and dock to the station on November 30, delivering more equipment and supplies. The Progress 30 vehicle at the station, loaded with trash and other discarded items, will undock November 14 and burn on re-entry over the Pacific Ocean.