Soyuz to Dock With ISS Thursday Night

The Russian space craft Soyuz TM-12 is scheduled to dock with the International Space Station (ISS) on Thursday (Korea standard time).

The Ministry of Education, Science and Technology and the Korea Aerospace Research Institute jointly announced on Wednesday that the Soyuz capsule and the Mission Control Center (MCC) succeeded in radio communication with the capsule right times as of 3 p.m. Wednesday.

Before this announcement, the ministry noted that the MCC said that the spacecraft had broken through the upper atmosphere over the South Atlantic Ocean.

An official with the institute announced, “Three astronauts, including Yi, communicated with the MCC for 20 minutes and she spoke in Russian.”

Baek Hong-yeol, the president of the Korea Aerospace Research Institute, said, “The Soyuz will dock with the ISS at 10:09 p.m. Thursday.”

Astronauts and the spacecraft are reportedly in good condition. Orbiting the earth every 90 minutes, the Soyuz is increasing its orbital elevation by 5.6 kilometers per orbit. The spacecraft will approach the ISS at a speed of 7.4 kilometers per second, 350 kilometers above the earth, after orbiting the earth 34 times.

Once the ISS is within visual range, the Soyuz astronauts will repeatedly use propulsion to adjust its speed and direction by the centimeter as it approaches the ISS. The probe at the top of the spacecraft will engage with the ISS’s docking device.

After docking, the ISS and the Russian capsule will match their air pressure, because if the hatch is opened when the pressure is unequal, the drastically changed atmospheric pressure will threaten the safety of the astronauts.

This process should occur automatically, but, if necessary, the commander, himself, will control the process. Once the docking, which lasts for three hours, is successfully completed, the three astronauts, including Russian commander Sergei Volkov, Russian flight engineer Oleg Kononenko and Yi will open the hatch of the Soyuz to move into the ISS at 0:50 a.m. Friday. When she arrives at the ISS, Flight Engineer Yuri Malenchenko, who is already at the ISS, will guide her to the work station.

After a welcoming ceremony for the three astronauts ends, she will have a brief conversation with her family and Korean representatives at the MCC. This process will be televised live at 1:20 a.m. Friday on SBS.

Yi will conduct her mission that includes science experiments and a lecture after a brief orientation. Her first mission is to conduct an experiment of plant growth: she will watch how radish and bean seeds grow in a weightless state. The institute sent 11 kinds of seeds to the ISS in Feb. in advance of this experiment.

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