ISS: Expedition 32

Crew & expedition duration:

Exp 32 crew path

Exp 32/33 path

Complet crew

Backup Crew

Mission details

• On Jul 1, 2012 at 0448 UTC Soyuz TMA-03M undocked from Rassvet under the command of Kononenko, with Expedition 32 beginning on ISS under the command of Padalka.
• Soyuz TMA-05M was launched on Jul 15, 2012 carrying Yuri Malenchenko (Roskosmos), Sunita Williams (NASA), and Akihiko Hoshide (JAXA); it docked with the Rassvet module on Jul 17 at 0451 UTC.
• On Jul 22, 2012 at 2026 UTC the Progress M-15M cargo vehicle undocked from Pirs; it was to return to ISS on Jul 24 in a test of the new Kurs-NA rendezvous system.
  At 0123 UTC on Jul 24 the Kurs-NA failed to start up correctly and the rendezvous was postponed, with Progress M-15M flying past the station at a distance of 3 km.
• Europe's Edoardo Amaldi ATV remains docked to the station.
  The Japanese HTV-3 was berthed on the Harmony node on Jul 27, 2012. The SSRMS grappled the HTV Exposed Pallet on Jul 27, and unberthed it at 0709 UTC on Aug 6. SSRMS transferred the EP to the JEM RMS arm, which then installed the EP on the Kibo Exposed Facility at the EFU 10 slot at 1204 UTC Aug 6 for offloading of its cargo, the SCAN and MCE packages.
  
  

  HTV-3 approch the station

  Hoshide in ISS module

  
  
  
• Progress M-15M redocked with Pirs at 0101 UTC on Jul 29, 2012 in a successful test of the new Kurs-NA automatic rendezvous system. The cargo ship undocked once more on Jul 30 at 2119 UTC; on Aug 6 it was in a 402 x 440 km orbit.
• Progress M-16M was launched on Aug 1, 2012 at 1935 UTC and tested a new fast rendezvous profile, docking with Pirs only 5hr 43min after launch on Aug 2 at 0118 UTC.
• On Aug 7 the Canadian SSRMS/Dextre robotics system was used to move NASA's SCaN Testbed payload from the EP to the ELC-3 pallet on the truss. On Aug 9 the Japanese JEM-RMS robot arm was used to move the MCE package from the EP to slot 8 in the EF. Finally, on Aug 10, the JEM and SSRMS arms were used to move the empty EP back into the HTV cargo ship; it will be destroyed on reentry after HTV undocks.
• On Aug 20 astronauts Padalka and Malencheko carried out 1st spacewalk VKD-31 from the Pirs module using spacesuits Orlan-MK No. 5 and 6. At 1829 UTC they ejected the Sfera-53 passive air density calibration satellite into a 401 x 406 km x 51.6 deg orbit using a special handling device delivered aboard Progress M-15M. (Sfera-53 was launched on Progress M-16M, and has a mass of 8.0 kg and a diameter of 0.53m.)
  
  

  Exp.32 crew

  EVA Padalka

  
  
  
• The Pirs airlock was depressurized at about 1518 UTC and its hatch was opened at 1537 UTC. The astronauts transferred the GsTM-2 crane from Pirs to Zarya. These and then GsTM-1 crane, moved in February, will therefore remain available after the old Pirs module, launched in 2001, is eventually discarded. Next, the crew installed five more space debris shields on Zvezda. The DPP debris shields were delivered in two bundles, packets 5 and 6, on Progress M-14M in January. The astronauts also retrieved a Biorisk experiment canister but were unable to pack up an SKK exposure cassette. The hatch was closed at 2128 UTC and the Pirs airlock was repressurized at 2133 UTC, for a duration of 5h 51m (hatch opened) or 6h15m (depressurized).
• The 28 Zvezda space debris shields were delivered in six bundles, as follows:

    Bundle  Panels      Launch              	Stored outside ISS: EVA   	Installed    EVA
    1      1-3,6-8      2002 Jun  5 STS-111 	2002 Jun  9, PMA-1 111/1  	2002 Aug 16  VKD-7
    2   11,13-15,18,19  2006 Dec 10 STS-116 	2006 Dec 16, PMA-3 116/3  	
                                            	2007 May 30, Zvez. VKD-18 	2007 Jun  6  VKD-19
    3   10,16,17,21-23  2006 Dec 10 STS-116 	2006 Dec 16, PMA-3 116/3  	
                                            	2007 May 30, Zvez. VKD-18 	2007 Jun  6  VKD-19
    4   4,5,9,12,20     2006 Dec 10 STS-116 	2006 Dec 16, PMA-3 116/3  	2007 May 30  VKD-18
    5       24-26       2012 Jan 25 M-14M   	-                         	2012 Aug 20  VKD-31
    6       27-28       2012 Jan 25 M-14M   	-                         	2012 Aug 20  VKD-31
  

  
  For example, Bundles 2 and 3 were stored outside ISS on the PMA-3 adapter from 2006 Dec 16 to 2007 May 30, then moved to another storage position on Zvezda, then finally installed on 2007 Jun 6 - thus featuring in three separate spacewalks.
• On Aug 30, 2012 astronauts Williams and Hoshide made spacewalk US EVA-18 from the Quest airlock using spacesuits EMU 3011 and 3015, to attempt replacement of a failed Main Bus Switching Unit (MBSU) on the S0 truss.
  The S0 carries four MBSUs designated MBSU-1 to MBSU-4; two spares are stored on the ESP-2 pallet outside the Quest module. One spare was delivered on STS-114 and a second on STS-120. The failed MBSU-1 was removed from S0 and stowed temporarily at ESP2; the STS-114 spare was removed from ESP-2 and moved to S0, becoming the 'new MBSU-1'. However, a problematic bolt stopped the astronauts completing the installation. They left the new MBSU-1 partly bolted to S0 and returned to the airlock, leaving the Station with two of its eight large solar arrays out of the main station power loop.
  Quest was depressurized for EVA-18 at about 1205 UTC on Aug 30, with an EVA duration of 8h28m (depress/repress), 8h17m (NASA rule), 8h14m (hatch open/close).
• On Sep 5 Williams and Hoshide tried again on US EVA-19. After problems with EMU 3015 on EVA-18, this time the duo used spacesuits EMU 3010 and 3011 respectively. The astronauts removed the new MBSU-1, with some difficulty unjamming the critical bolt, and then spent an hour using several techniques to clean out metal shavings and foreign matter from the bolt. Between 1522 and 1550 UTC the installation of the new MBSU-1 was successfully carried out, and station power was mostly restored, although in the meantime the failure of the DSCU-3A box has taken down another of the arrays. The astronauts then replaced a CLPA camera on the SSRMS robot arm and returned to the airlock. The old MBSU-1 remains in its `temporary' stowage location on ESP-2.
  
  

  EVA Hoshide

  EVA Williams

  
  Quest was depressurized at 1101 UTC Sep 5 for a duration of 6h33m (depress/repress), 6h28m (NASA rule), 6h25m (Hatch open/close).
• On Sep 12, 2012 the Japanese HTV-3 cargo ship was unberthed by the SSRMS arm at about 1202 UTC and released into space at 1550 UTC. After one of HTV-3's onboard computers failed, a planned small separation burn was replaced by a much larger abort burn which safely and rapidly separated HTV-3 from the vicinity of the ISS. HTV-3 was successfully deorbited over the Pacific on Sep 14.
  
  

  HTV-3 departure

  Williams in ISS module

  
  
  
• On Sep 16, 2012 at 2309 UTC Soyuz TMA-04M undocked from Poisk carrying Expedition 32 crew Gennadiy Padalka, Sergey Revin and Joe Acaba, marking the beginning of ISS Expedition 33 under the command of NASA's Capt. Sunita Lyn Williams, USN, with crewmembers Flight Engineer-4 Yuriy Malenchenko (Roskosmos) and Flight Engineer-6 Akihiko Hoshide (JAXA).

External links:

• Wikipedia: Exp. descriptions
• Spacefacts: Exp. description