The Soyuz TMA-15 spacecraft carrying the Expedition 20 crew lifted off from Baikonur Cosmodrome at 6:34 AM EDT Wednesday. The Expedition 20 crew members are Roman Romanenko, Frank De Winne and Robert Thirsk.
Expedition 20 marks the start of six-person crew operations aboard the International Space Station. The Expedition 19 crew, already aboard the station, consists of Gennady Padalka, Michael Barratt, and Koichi Wakata.
Space Shuttle Atlantis and the STS-125 crew landed on runway 22 at Edwards Air Force Base in California on Sunday, May 24, 2009. During the 13-day mission, the STS-125 crew performed five spacewalks, servicing and upgrading Hubble. With the new upgrades, the Hubble Space Telescope has an improved discovery power, and it will continue to be operational for at least five years.
Read more about STS-125 on the Hubble Servicing Mission 4 page on NASA\’s website.
Apollo 10, the fourth manned mission in the Apollo program, was a dress rehearsal for a moon landing mission. The mission included an all-up test of the Lunar Module in lunar orbit. During the tests, on May 22, 1969, the Lunar Module came to within 15 km of the lunar surface.
The Apollo 10 crew consisted of Commander Thomas P. Stafford, Command Module Pilot John W. Young, and Lunar Module Pilot Eugene A. Cernan.
Skylab was launched on May 14, 1973, by a two-stage version of the Saturn V launch vehicle. This unmanned launch was designated as Skylab 1. During the launch, Skylab lost its micrometeorid shield/sun shade and one of the main solar panels. Skylab underwent repairs during a spacewalk by the first crew, which launched on May 25, 1973.
Find out more about the Skylab missions on the dedicated Skylab page on NASA Kennedy Space Center\’s website.
Herschel and Planck lifted of on board an Ariane 5 launch vehicle from Europe\’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, on May 14, 2009.
The objectives that ESA set for the Herschel Space Observatory are ambitious: the study of the galaxies in the early universe, the investigation of the creation of stars, the observation of the chemical composition of the atmosphere and surfaces of comets, planets and satellites, as well as examining the molecular chemistry of the universe.
ESA plans to answer questions like how did the Universe begin, how did it evolve to its present state, and how will it continue to evolve in the future? with Planck. The Planck Mission will collect CMB radiation measurements using highly sensitive sensors that are operating at very low temperatures. The measurements will be used to map the smallest variations of the CMB detected to date.
Read more about Herschel and Planck…
On May 12, 2009, Progress 33 docked to the International Space Station. Progress 33 arrived at the space station with more than 2,500 kg of supplies.
The Progress is a Russian expendable cargo spacecraft. Progress was derived from the Soyuz spacecraft and it is launched with a Soyuz launch vehicle. The cargo spacecraft is used to carry supplies to the International Space Station, and it is also used to de-orbit waste from the station. Progress is destroyed on re-entry.
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