Rassvet Module Installed on the ISS

The 12-astronaut crew aboard the International Space Station (ISS) installed a new room on the orbital facility yesterday. The procedure ended at 8:20 am EDT (1320 GMT) Tuesday, when flight engineers managed to steer the Russian-built Mini Research Module-1 (MRM-1) to its docking berth, located on the nadir port of the Russian Zarya module. The delivery was done flawlessly, officials at the American space agency announce. The new room will double as a cargo storage room, and a docking port for Russian-built Soyuz and progress capsules.

At the beginning of the work, which did not require a spacewalk, Atlantis Commander Ken Ham and Pilot Tony Antonelli maneuvered the robotic arm on the space shuttle to remove the MRM-1 from its position in the spacecraft's payload bay. Then, they moved the room to a position where it could be safely handed over to the Canadarm-2, the main robotic arm of the ISS. After the transfer was completed, Expedition 23 Commander Oleg Kotov oversaw the automated docking process between Rassvet (the Russian name for MRM-1) and Zarya, from within the Russian segment of the orbital facility. The astronauts met no difficulties in attaching their latest addition to the space lab.

“Mission Specialists Garrett Reisman and Piers Sellers were at the station arm controls to maneuver MRM-1 to its new position on the Russian segment. Mission Specialists Michael Good and Steve Bowen are preparing for the mission’s next spacewalk. They are 'camping out' in the Quest airlock overnight and prepared the suits and gathered tools needed for their extravehicular excursion on Wednesday,” NASA officials write in a press release.

Space shuttle Atlantis is currently performing its 32nd flight into space, under the name STS-132. This is its last planned mission, according to the new NASA plan of retiring the space shuttles by the end of this year. The orbiter will not be decommissioned upon return, NASA representatives say. Rather, it will be prepared for a potential extra launch in November, as a contingency plan for Endeavor's last planned flight. If something goes wrong during the last shuttle flight ever, Atlantis will be on stand-by to intervene, and rescue the crew on its sister spacecraft.