Crews
are rotated every few months on the International Space Station. They are
pretty much routine occurrences these days, so the three astronauts and one cosmonaut have got the
docking and hatch opening procedures down to a tee. Even so, there is still a
sense of jeopardy.It’s
easy to forget that, while watching the crew calmly floating around, the ISS and the Dragon Endeavour capsule are hurtling around Earth at about 17,500 miles per hour (282km per hour).So, docking two ports the size of a manhole is not a
straightforward matter. This is aided by automatic control systems, but
sometimes there are last minute glitches, as happened when the British astronaut
Tim Peake arrived in 2015. In a dramatic few minutes, the Army Air Corps
officer had to take manual control of the process.The Crew-8 docking went smoothly today. Attention now is focused on the hatch opening
sequence – to ensure that the new crew can safely exit the spacecraft and board
the ISS to start their shift.
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are rotated every few months on the International Space Station. They are
pretty much routine occurrences these days, so the three astronauts and one cosmonaut have got the
docking and hatch opening procedures down to a tee. Even so, there is still a
sense of jeopardy.It’s
easy to forget that, while watching the crew calmly floating around, the ISS and the Dragon Endeavour capsule are hurtling around Earth at about 17,500 miles per hour (282km per hour).So, docking two ports the size of a manhole is not a
straightforward matter. This is aided by automatic control systems, but
sometimes there are last minute glitches, as happened when the British astronaut
Tim Peake arrived in 2015. In a dramatic few minutes, the Army Air Corps
officer had to take manual control of the process.The Crew-8 docking went smoothly today. Attention now is focused on the hatch opening
sequence – to ensure that the new crew can safely exit the spacecraft and board
the ISS to start their shift.nnDiscussion:nn” ai_name=”RocketNews AI: ” start_sentence=”Can I tell you more about this article?” text_input_placeholder=”Type ‘Yes'”]