Expedition 41 crew portrait on the International Space Station. From left: ESA astronaut Alexander Gerst, Roscosmos cosmonauts Elena Serova, Maxim Suraev and Alexander Samokutyaev, and NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman and Barry Wilmore.
The rear astronauts are dressed in the Sokol suits they will wear in their Soyuz spacecraft that will take them back to Earth on 9 November. Alexander, Max and Reid were making sure their suits still fit and have no leaks after having been stored on arrival at the Station almost six months ago.
Yelena, Alexander Samokutyaev and Barry will continue working in the weightless research centre, but they will not feel lonely for long.
ESA astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti, NASA astronaut Terry Virts and Roscosmos cosmonaut Anton Shkaplerov will join their colleagues on 24 November.
Alexander Gerst commented on this image: “The International Space Station Expedition 41 crew. My favourite selfie in space!”
A Soyuz TMA-14M spacecraft will launch a new U.S.-Russian crew on a swift six-hour flight to the International Space Station today (Sept. 25), and you can watch the action in space live online.
A Russian Soyuz rocket carrying the Soyuz TMA-14M spacecraft towers over its launch pad at Baikonur Cosmodrome ahead of a Sept. 26, 2014 local time launch (Sept. 25 Eastern Time). The mission will launch the new Expedition 41 crew to the International Space Station. Credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky
NASA astronaut Barry "Butch" Wilmore and cosmonauts Alexander Samokutyaev and Elena Serova are poised to blast off for the space station at 4:25 p.m. EDT (2025 GMT) from the Central Asian spaceport of Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, where it will be early Friday morning, Sept. 26, local time.
Serova will make a bit of space history with the launch, when she becomes Russia's fourth female cosmonaut to fly in space and the first Russian woman on the International Space Station.
You can watch the Soyuz launch webcast live on NASA TV, beginning at 3:30 p.m. EDT (1930 GMT).
NASA will also provide a live webcast of the Soyuz spacecraft's arrival at the space station at 9:45 p.m. EDT (0145 GMT), and another webcast at 11:30 p.m. EDT (0330 GMT) as the Soyuz crew joins the current station residents.
Wilmore, Samokutyaev and Serova will live and work aboard the International Space Station until March 2015, first as part of the outpost's Expedition 41 crew and later as the core of its Expedition 42 crew.
"[I'm] looking forward, actually, to all of it," Wilmore told reporters, adding that he was especially excited about the science and possible spacewalks during the flight. "It's all going to be great and fascinating."
The Soyuz launch today will mark the second spaceflight for Wilmore, 52, who is a captain in the U.S. Navy and hails from Mt. Juliet, Tennessee, but this flight will be his first long-duration trip to the space station.
He last visited the space station in 2011 as part of its Expedition 27/28 crew, and spent 164 days in space. Samokutyaev is from Penza, Russia, and is a lieutenant colonel in the Russian Air Force.
Cosmonaut Elena Serova, 38, is the only spaceflight rookie on the Soyuz crew launching today. Like Samokutyaev, she is a test cosmonaut, but Serova is not a member of the Russian military.
She was selected as a test engineer cosmonaut for Russia's Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) in 2006.
Serova counts Russia's female cosmonaut pioneers Valentina Tereshkova (the first woman in space), Svetlana Savitskaya (the first female spacewalker) and Elena Kodakova among her role models.
"When I was in school my first teacher told us about different achievements in cosmonautics, and I was very much impressed by those first flights, from Svetlana Savitskaya in particular, who was the first woman performing a spacewalk," Serova said in a NASA interview. "She was an amazing individual."
Today, Serova is the first female Russian cosmonaut to launch since Kodakova's final flight in 1997, aboard a NASA space shuttle.
Kodakova spent 169 days in space on Russia's space station Mir between October 1994 and March 1997, then revisited Mir for just over nine days in 1997 during the shuttle mission.
Serova said she is aware that her mission might serve as an inspiration to other Russian girls today, just as those earlier missions inspired her.
The International Space Station is featured in this image photographed by an STS-132 crew member on board the Space Shuttle Atlantis after the station and shuttle began their post-undocking relative separation. Credit: NASA/Crew of STS-132
The Russian news agency ITAR-TASS is claiming that Russian officials have confirmed that Russian cosmonauts have found sea plankton on the outside of the International Space Station.
The news agency reports that the cosmonauts have also found traces of other organisms on the outside of the station as well.
To date, no other news group has been able to confirm the report and thus far it appears no other agency, including NASA has been able to confirm the claims made by the Russians.
Finding sea plankton on the outside of the ISS would be remarkable, as the outside of the station is of course exposed to space, a hostile environment, to say the least.
NASA officials reported that they were aware that Russian cosmonauts were conducting experiments on the exterior of the space station (primarily on windows known as illuminators), but were unaware of what they entailed.
They note that cosmonauts have conducted such experiments as recently as this past week. The same officials report that they have not heard the results of any findings regarding the experiments from the Russian scientists directly, and thus, cannot comment on what the Russians are claiming.
One scientist with NASA, Lynn Rothschild, suggested that if the claims turn out to be true, the plankton likely made its way to the ISS aboard a space station module.
Reports of the sea plankton findings have come, ITAR-TASS reports, from Vladimir Solovyev, chief of the Russian ISS orbital mission, he's also reporting that the type of plankton found is not native to the parts of Russia where spacecraft are launched, he theorizes that air currents could have pushed the plankton to the station (plankton is known to make its way into the atmosphere).
The findings, he continues, confirm that organisms can live on the outer surface of the space station, something Russian scientists have apparently been studying for over a year, though he didn't actually come right out and say that the specimens found were still alive.
He also reports that the outside of the space station is covered with material from spacecraft engines that is emitted as they come and go. Of concern are the illuminators, which now need to be polished.
The six newly-appointed members of Russia's cosmonaut corps pose with the chief of the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City. From left to right: Oleg Blinov, Nikolai Chub, Sergei Korsakov, Yuri Lonchakov, Dimitri Petelin, Andrei Fedyaev, Pyotr Dubrov. Credit: Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center
Six new cosmonauts joined the ranks of Russia's space agency on Monday (June 16), two short of the eight candidates who started basic training for the job two years ago.
Among the two who did not make the cut was the group's only woman. By coincidence, the announcement came 51 years to day after Russia launched the world's first female cosmonaut into space.
Since then, only two more Russian women have flown into orbit, with the fourth set to launch later this year.
An interagency commission including representatives from Russia's federal space agency Roscosmos, as well as the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City and from the Russian aerospace companies RSC Energia and Khrunichev approved the six men to be the 2012 class of test-cosmonauts.
As a group, they will next begin training for spaceflights to become eligible for crew assignments.
"I congratulate your successfully passing the cosmonaut training course and passing the state [final] exam," former cosmonaut Yuri Lonchakov, the chief of the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center, told the graduates.
The six include Oleg Blinov, Nikolai Chub, Pyotr Dubrov, Andrei Fedyaev, Sergei Korsakov and Dimitri Petelin. The group ranges in age from 30 to 36.
They're all mechanical or software engineers, with the exception of Fedyaev, who is a military pilot.
Five of the cosmonauts hail from Russia. Petelin was born in Kustanai, Kazakhstan, where landing ceremonies have been held for crews returning from the International Space Station.
Among the two candidates who did not qualify was Ignat Ignatov, a 32 year old engineer who had previously worked for eight years as a neutral buoyancy spacewalk instructor at the cosmonaut training center.
In April, it was reported that Ignatov had failed a medical exam and as such, was considered unfit for further training.
Anna Kikina is seen taking part in water survival training as one of the eight cosmonaut candidates selected in 2012. In June 2014, Kikina was not among the group’s six members to advance to spaceflight training. Credit: Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center
Anna Kikina, 29, was also absent from the graduation for reasons that were not stated.
An engineer and economist, she was working at a radio station in Siberia at the time of her selection for basic training.
Yelena Serova, who was selected in 2006, is scheduled to launch on her first mission in September.
Serova's flight to the International Space Station will make her only the 58th women in history to leave the Earth out of the more than 500 worldwide space explorers.
Roscosmos began recruiting for this cosmonaut class in January 2012, opening the process to the general Russian public for the first time in the country's history.
Out of the total of 304 applications received, 51 were deemed eligible from which the eight were selected.
The addition of the six new cosmonauts on Monday brings the Russian corps to a total of 46 active members.
The crew of the International Space Station (ISS) has been alerted to a little smoke coming from the Russian module, NASA website reported Wednesday.
The smoke was coming out of a vent in the Zvezda Service Module, according to the US space agency.
The Russian segment's ventilation system was isolated by flight controllers at the mission control center in Houston, RIA Novosti report.
"Expedition 40 Commander Steve Swanson reported that the smoke quickly subsided and the crew was not in any danger,"NASA added.
Russian flight controllers determined that the smoke was most likely caused by a heater for the Russian segment's water reclamation unit used for cooking.
Three crew members of the International Space Station have returned safely to Earth, ending their six-month orbital mission.
A Russian Soyuz capsule carrying NASA astronaut Rick Mastracchio, Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata and cosmonaut Mikhail Tyurin landed on the steppes of Kazakhstan at 9:58 p.m. EDT Tuesday night (May 13; 7:58 a.m. local time on Wednesday, May 14).
The Soyuz undocked from the space station 3 1/2 hours earlier while the two vehicles were above Mongolia, marking the end of Expedition 39 and the beginning of Expedition 40 aboard the orbiting lab.
"What an exciting time we shared in this increment," Expedition 39 Commander Wakata said Monday (May 12) as he handed the station's reins over to NASA astronaut Steve Swanson.
"Congratulations, and best wishes to the crew of Expedition 40 for a successful mission."
Wakata, Mastracchio and Tyurin enjoyed an eventful and historic stint in orbit after arriving at the space station on Nov. 7, 2013.
For example, Wakata became the first Japanese person ever to command the station when he took charge of Expedition 39 on March 10.
Just four days later, Wakata and Mastracchio participated in "Live from Space," a two-hour TV event hosted by Soledad O'Brien that aired on National Geographic Channel, as well as Channel 4 in the United Kingdom.
"Live from Space" gave viewers in more than 140 countries an idea of what it's like to live and work on the orbiting lab, with Wakata giving a guided tour of the $100-billion complex.
Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata, commander of the International Space Station's Expedition 39 mission, is helped out of the Soyuz capsule.
Expedition 39, now a six-member crew, talks to family and mission officials moments after entering the space station for the first time on March 27, 2014. Credit: NASA TV
Three new crew members have finally made it to the International Space Station, two days later than originally planned.
A Russian Soyuz spacecraft carrying NASA astronaut Steve Swanson and cosmonauts Alexander Skvortsov and Oleg Artemyev docked with the orbiting lab at 7:53 p.m. EDT (2353 GMT) Thursday (March 27), as the two spacecraft cruised over southern Brazil.
The hatch linking the two vehicles opened at 10:35 p.m. EDT Thursday, NASA officials said.
The three spaceflyers blasted off Tuesday afternoon EDT (March 25) and were slated to arrive at the station just six hours later, but the Soyuz failed to complete one of the automated burns required to pull off this "fast track" trip, forcing mission controllers to revert to a more traditional two-day chase and rendezvous.
All systems on the Soyuz now appear to be functioning normally, NASA officials said in an update Wednesday (March 26).
The arrival of Swanson, Skvortsov and Artemyev brings the space station back up to its full complement of six crew members.
The newcomers join NASA's Rick Mastracchio, Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata (ISS Commander) and cosmonaut Mikhail Tyurin, rounding out the current Expedition 39 aboard the orbiting lab.
Mastracchio, Expedition 39 commander Wakata and Tyurin had had the $100 billion station all to themselves since March 10, when another Soyuz capsule ferried the previous Russian-U.S. crew back down to Earth.
Engineers document cargo as it is unloaded from the Soyuz TMA-10M spacecraft after it landed with Expedition 38 Commander Oleg Kotov of the Russian Federal Space Agency, Roscosmos, and Flight Engineers: Mike Hopkins of NASA, and, SergeyRyazanskiy of Roscosmos, near the town of Zhezkazgan, Kazakhstan on Tuesday, March 11, 2014. Hopkins, Kotov and Ryazanskiy returned to Earth after five and a half months onboard the International Space Station where they served as members of the Expedition 37 and 38 crews. Image Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls
Oleg Kotov and Sergey Ryazanskiy quickly got one of two commercially provided cameras installed outside the International Space Station, a task requiring multiple power connections.
Everything checked out well, unlike the spacewalk last month.
The two men worked so hard that Russian Mission Control outside Moscow urged them to "get your breath."
"We'll force ourselves to rest," one of the spacewalkers replied in Russian.
The astronauts had hooked up the Earth-observing cameras during a spacewalk after Christmas but ground controllers received no data from the cameras, and the spacewalkers had to haul everything back in.
The problem was traced to indoor cabling and fixed, according to NASA.
This time, after the spacewalkers reattached the high-definition camera to the outside of the Russian portion of the space station, good electrical connectivity was reported between the instrument and Russian Mission Control.
NASA spokesman Rob Navias said Russian flight controllers were pleased with the results.
Next, Kotov and Ryazanskiy tackled the medium-resolution camera.
Images from these new cameras will be distributed by the Canadian company that owns them, UrtheCast Corp.
The cameras were launched to the space station in November in a deal between UrtheCast and the Russian Space Agency.
UrtheCast will post video on its website and sell images. The company expects it will take three months to calibrate the cameras, and that the system should be fully operational by summer.
The four other space station astronauts—two Americans, one Japanese and another Russian—monitored the spacewalk from inside.
Cosmonauts Oleg Kotov, Expedition 38 commander, and flight engineer Sergey Ryazanskiy perform a spacewalk outside the International Space Station on Dec. 27, 2013. NASA astronaut Rick Mastracchio took this photo from inside the station. Credit: NASA/Rick Mastracchio, via @AstroRM
Two Russian cosmonauts installed new HD camera eyes on the International Space Station during a record-setting spacewalk Friday (Dec. 27), only to have to return the devices inside due to an unspecified data glitch.
Cosmonauts Oleg Kotov and Sergey Ryazanskiy spent just over eight hours — a new endurance record for Russian spacewalks — working outside the space station to install the new Earth-watching cameras for the Canadian company UrtheCast as part of an agreement with Russia's Federal Space Agency. But shortly after the installation, Russian engineers reported a problem receiving data from the imaging system.
"It appears that we have seen an unsuccessful attempt at bringing those two cameras to life," NASA spokesman Rob Navias said during spacewalk commentary. "The exact cause of the problem is not known at this time."
The new cameras are designed to snap detailed views of Earth from space for UrtheCast, which will then provide the imagery to customers via the Internet.
They launched to the station in late November on the Russian Progress 53 cargo ship.
"UrtheCast's two cameras will stream unprecedented footage of our evolving Earth to anyone with an internet connection," the company's website promises.
"In near real-time, you will be able to visit your favorite locales and learn about current events as they unfold."
The UrtheCast cameras include a high-resolution instrument on a swivel platform for detailed observations, and a medium-resolution instrument attached to a fixed platform.
Both cameras were initially installed by Kotov and Ryazanskiy on their respective Earth-facing platforms outside the station's Zvezda service module.
"When the flight control team at the Russian Mission Control Center outside Moscow did not see the expected telemetry and electrical connectivity from the newly installed medium and high resolution cameras, Kotov and Ryazanskiy were directed to remove the cameras and return them to the airlock for further analysis," NASA officials said in a statement.
"The spacewalkers also were instructed to take detailed photographs of the electrical connectors mated earlier for additional review."
Two Russian cosmonauts are tackling a seven-hour spacewalk outside the International Space Station today (Dec. 27) to install commercial high-resolution cameras and other new experiments on the orbiting lab's hull. You can watch the spacewalk live here in the window above.
Today's spacewalk began at about 8 a.m. EST (1300 GMT) and is being performed by Russian cosmonauts Oleg Kotov and Sergey Ryazanskiy.
The two spacewalkers will install two high-fidelity cameras on the Earth-facing side of the station's Russian-built Zvezda service module for the commercial Earth imagery company Urthecast (pronounced Earthcast), which seeks to offer live HD webcasts of Earth from space via an online service.
Today's spacewalk is unrelated to two earlier spacewalks by American astronauts to replace a coolant pump on the space station.
Kotov and Ryazanskiy will also install hardware for a new earthquake-monitoring experiment, called Seismoprognoz, and remove and older experiment that tracked the seismic effects of high-energy particles in the near-Earth environment, NASA officials said.
That older experiment, called Vsplesk, will be tossed into space in a direction that won't endanger the space station so it can burn up in Earth's atmosphere.
The spacewalkers will also dispose of a frame to an old material exposure experiment and retrieve a case of samples from a materials space exposure experiment during their work outside the International Space Station.
Spacewalker Oleg Kotov is seen with the Olympic torch outside the International Space Station, Nov. 9, 2013. Credit: NASA TV
Olympic history unfolded outside the International Space Station Saturday morning (Nov. 9) as two Russian cosmonauts carried an unlit Olympic torch on a symbolic spacewalk relay for the 2014 Games.
Emerging from the orbital outpost at 9:34 a.m. EST (1434 GMT) through a hatch on the Pirs docking module, Oleg Kotov and Sergey Ryazanskiy with Russia's federal space agency Roscosmos began the planned six-hour excursion by posing with the torch for an unprecedented photo opp.
"We will take a picture of it with the space station in the background, with the Earth in the background, and we will try to make sure that we see Russia, and maybe Sochi where the Olympic Games will take place," Kotov said of the torch relay in a NASA interview.
"I think these will be very interesting videos and pictures that will be used to promote the Olympic Games."
"We will be part of this whole chain, part of this wonderful relay of the Olympic torch," Ryazanskiy said.
"The most interesting part here is that our relatives, our families, will be participating in this relay as well. My wife and Oleg Kotov's daughter on Earth will be participating in the relay," the 38-year-old Expedition 37/38 flight engineer said.
Russian cosmonaut Fyodor Yurchikhin works outside the International Space Station, with the Earth far below, in this still from a NASA broadcast on Aug. 16, 2013. Credit: NASA TV
Two cosmonauts set a new record for the longest Russian spacewalk on Friday (Aug. 16), spending more than seven hours working outside the International Space Station to prepare it for the addition of a new Russian-built orbital lab.
Veteran cosmonaut Fyodor Yurchikhin and flight engineer Alexander Misurkin spent a total of seven hours and 29 minutes — a new Russian record — on a spacewalk to install power and data cables for a new Russian laboratory module expected to launch to the space station in upcoming months.
NASA spokesman Rob Navias said the cosmonauts broke a Russian spacewalking record that had stood for 23 years.
Before Friday, the longest spacewalk by two Russian cosmonauts was seven hours and 16 minutes. It occurred on July, 17 1990 and was performed by cosmonauts Anatoly Solovyev and Alekandr Balandin to repair thermal protection gear on Russia's Mir Space Station.
"Today, that mark eclipsed by Yurchikhin and Misurkin," Navias said.
Friday's spacewalk was originally supposed to last 6.5 hours, but Russian flight controllers opted to extend it to allow time to retract a hand-operated extendable crane, called Strela, back into place.
The cosmonauts initially planned to leave the crane extended for another spacewalk set for Aug. 22
Yurchikhin and Misurkin spent most of their time Friday installing two long power cables and a data cable on an Earth-facing Pirs docking compartment, which faces the Earth and will ultimately replaced with the new, and larger, Nauka Multipurpose Laboratory. Nauka means "Science" in Russian.
The cable installation was hard on the cosmonauts' hands, since they had to tackle the stiff cables with bulky spacesuit-clad gloves.
"Alright guys, take a break … relax your hands," Russian Mission Control radioed the pair.
But the work appeared to go smoothly, with Yurchikhin and Misurkin also installing a materials science experiment on the station's exterior and a guide line that can be used by future spacewalkers.
At one point, one of the cosmonauts was heard humming to himself as they wrapped up their work.
Friday's spacewalk was the fourth of five spacewalks planned for the Expedition 36 crew on the International Space Station, and the first of two spacewalks scheduled in August. Yurchikhin and Misurkin will venture outside the station on Aug. 22 to install equipment for new science experiments.
Russian cosmonauts are taking a spacewalk to lay cable for a new lab that's due to arrive at the International Space Station in a few months.
Fyodor Yurchikhin (fee-YOH'-dur yur-CHEE'-kihn) and Aleksandr Misurkin (miz-UR'-kin) floated outside Friday. It's one month since their Italian crewmate almost drowned when leaking water flooded his helmet during a spacewalk.
In this frame grab from video provided by NASA, two Russian flight engineers perform maintenance on the International Space Station, Monday, June 24, 2013. The crew includes three Russians, two Americans and one Italian. The Italian and one American will conduct a pair of spacewalks for NASA in July. (AP Photo/NASA)
Two space station astronauts took care of a little outside maintenance Monday.
Russian flight engineers Fyodor Yurchikhin and Alexander Misurkin replaced a main valve on the International Space Station, after emerging from their 250-mile (400-kilometer)-high home.
"To save the time, I'm embroidering," one of the spacewalkers said in Russian, holding a clump of cord as he worked on the fluid valve. "It's not easy to handle all these ropes."
Later, he added, "OK, now we're doing bead work."
Also on the spacewalkers' to-do list: installing clamps and retrieving science experiments.
Some of the work will pave the way for the arrival of a new Russian compartment at the end of this year.
The year's third spacewalk was under the direction of Russian Mission Control outside Moscow. The four other space station residents monitored the action from inside.
Yurchikhin arrived at the space station just a few weeks ago. Misurkin has been on board since March.
The crew includes three Russians, two Americans and one Italian.
The Italian and one American will conduct a pair of spacewalks for NASA in July.
Begun in 1998, the space station still is one room short.
The Russian Space Agency plans to launch a research lab to replace the Pirs air lock that has been in place since 2001.
An unmanned Proton rocket will hoist the lab, which also will serve as an air lock for spacewalk preparations and a docking port for visiting craft.
As for Pirs—Russian for pier—it will be cut loose before the launch of its replacement and burn up upon re-entry as junk.
Photo of the Automated Transfer Vehicle being prepared to move to the Ariane 5 final assembly building last week. Credit: ESA /CNES /Arianespace /Photo Optique video du CSG /P Baudon
The robotic spacecraft's tanks are filled with propellant, water, air and pure oxygen.
Technicians will load the ATV's cargo module with fresh food and other last-minute items over next week before the Ariane 5's 17.7-foot-diameter payload fairing is added to enshroud the resupply freighter.
Christened Albert Einstein, the cargo craft is Europe's fourth Automated Transfer Vehicle. When it blasts off June 5, the freighter will be the heaviest spacecraft ever launched by Europe - weighing in at an estimated 44,610 pounds, according to the European Space Agency.
It is also the largest vehicle to visit the space station since the retirement of the space shuttle. The ATV measures 32 feet long and 15 feet wide, and its four solar panels, arranged in a distinctive X-shaped patten, stretch out 73 feet tip-to-tip when extended in space.
Each ATV can haul three times more cargo than Russian Progress resupply spacecraft, and twice as much mass as SpaceX's Dragon cargo ship.
The massive spacecraft does not return cargo. At the end of each mission, it falls back into the atmosphere and burns up, disposing of trash in a safety zone over the Pacific Ocean.
The Albert Einstein spacecraft arrived last year at the European-run spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana.
Timed to the second in order to reach the space station, the launch is set for June 5 at 2136:59 GMT (5:36:59 p.m. EDT; 6:36:59 p.m. Kourou time).
The launch time could change slightly based on further tracking of the space station's orbit, according to Alberto Novelli, ESA's ATV 4 mission manager.
The Ariane 5 ES rocket, missing its payload, rolled to the final assembly building in Kourou in March. Credit: ESA /CNES /Arianespace /Photo Optique video du CSG /S Martin
Docking with the space station's Zvezda service module is scheduled for June 15.
Managers decided on May 8 to continue preparations for launch June 5, but engineers are analyzing a potential problem with a navigation aid attached to the space station's docking port.
Officials are concerned a stuck antenna on a Russian Progress resupply craft may have damaged a laser reflector mounted on the aft end of the Zvezda module.
Reflectors are used in concert with the ATV's laser-guided navigation system to feed range, orientation and closing rate information to the ATV's computers, which control the spacecraft's automatic approach to the space station.
An array of 26 reflectors is positioned on the back end of the Zvezda module, beaming laser light back to sensors on the ATV, creating unique light patterns captured and recognized by the spacecraft's cameras.
The ATV carries a backup system using telegoniometers, similar to police radar guns, to emit laser light at a different wavelength up to 10,000 times per second.
Engineers suspected contamination may have damaged the old reflector.
Novelli said the reflector suspected of damage from the Progress docking is in a different location and has a different use than the unit replaced during the April 19 spacewalk.
Until the Progress leaves the space station, there is no way to inspect the reflector without another spacewalk.
NASA's Kevin Ford and Russian cosmonauts Oleg Novitskiy and Evgeny Tarelkin, who had manned the $100 billion orbital outpost since October as Expedition 34, landed in cloudy weather at 7:06 a.m. Moscow time (0306 GMT) northeast of the town of Arkalyk.
They had spent 144 days aboard the multinational ISS on their space journey of almost 61 million miles (98 million km).
"The landing was energetic and exciting," Russian TV showed Novitskiy as saying.
NASA television said the deorbit burn and other events during the descent had gone flawlessly. It said the capsule had landed upright, almost hitting its bull's eye target in thick fog.
"Oleg Novitskiy reported to search and recovery teams that the crew is feeling good," NASA television said. "Everything seems to be in order."
Due to hampered visibility, it took a few minutes before helicopters with Russian search and recovery teams could locate the Soyuz capsule after its landing.
The first images shown by Russia's Vesti-24 television featured rescue workers standing in a snow-covered steppe opening the hatch of the capsule.
The three smiling astronauts were seated on semi-reclined chairs and covered with blue thermal blankets. They were then carried to a nearby inflatable medical tent.
On Friday, fog and freezing rain at the landing site in Kazakhstan prevented helicopters from setting up for the crew's return to Earth.
In preparation for their departure, Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield took the helm of the space station on Wednesday, becoming the first Canadian to take command of the outpost.
It is only the second time in the 12-year history of the station, a project of 15 nations that has been permanently staffed since November 2000, that command has been turned over to someone who is not American or Russian.
A Russian Soyuz capsule carrying U.S. astronaut Joseph Acaba and Russian cosmonauts Gennady Padalka and Sergei Revin landed on the Kazakh steppe at 8:53 local time (0253 GMT) Monday.
U.S. astronaut Acaba and Russian cosmonauts Padalka and Revin rests
after landing near the town of Arkalyk in northern Kazakhstan Monday.
The Expedition 32 crew, which arrived at the International Space Station May 17, returned to Earth after a four-month (123 days) stay there.
During their stay on the ISS, the trio orbited Earth 2,000 times and traveled 52,906,428 miles, according to NASA.
Padalka, who has spent a total of 711 days during four flights and ranks fourth for the most days spent in space, piloted the craft back to Earth.
Nasa Astronaut Acaba
NASA astronaut Sunita Williams, Russian cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko and Japanese astronaut Akihiko Hoshide remain on the ISS. Williams took command of Expedition 33 after the Soyuz spacecraft separated from the space station.
The trio on the ISS would be joined by NASA's Kevin Ford and Russia's Oleg Novitsky and Yevgeny Tarelkin in October.
The U.S. depends on Russia to send its astronauts to the ISS ever since NASA's shuttle program came to an end in July 2011. Russia charges NASA $60 million per astronaut.
This still image from a NASA TV broadcast shows how Russian cosmonauts will move a crane outside the International Space Station during a spacewalk on Aug. 20, 2012.
CREDIT: NASA TV
A suspected leaky valve on the International Space Station stalled the start of a spacewalk by Russian cosmonauts for nearly an hour today (Aug. 20), forcing them to wait in bulky spacesuits until it was deemed safe to venture outside.
Veteran cosmonauts Gennady Padalka and Yuri Malenchenko were preparing to begin their space station spacewalk when the leak was detected during air pressure tests.
Russian flight controllers at the station's Mission Control Center in Moscow asked the cosmonauts to stay put until the leaky valve could be isolated.
Padalka, the space station's commander, agreed.
"We're in no rush," Padalka radioed Mission Control in Russian, which was translated in a NASA broadcast.
Flight controllers spent almost an hour trying to isolate the leaky valve and monitoring air pressure inside the station's airlock and adjoining modules.
Ultimately, they radioed good news to the spacewalkers — the leak was resolved and it was safe to proceed. It was welcome news for the cosmonauts.
"We're just hanging here and it's kind of boring," Padalka said.
At 11:37 a.m. EDT (1337 GMT) — nearly an hour late — the two cosmonauts finally opened the space station's airlock hatch and prepared to get to work.
The 6.5 hour extra vehicular activity (EVA) involved cosmonauts Commander Gennady Padalka and Flight Engineer Yuri Malenchenko.
The main objective of the EVA was to move the Strela-2 cargo boom to the Zarya module from the Pirs docking compartment.
Moving the boom is part of a plan to make room for the new Russian multipurpose laboratory module, called Nauka, to dock to the Zvezda nadir port.
Moving the boom will also aid in preparing for undocking and disposal of the Russian Pirs docking module.
Other tasks performed during the EVA were the installation of shields designed to protect the space station from micrometeoroids.
The shields were installed on the outside of the Zvezda service module.
Padalka and Malenchenko have previously performed eight and four spacewalks respectively, and this EVA is the 163rd to take place in order to maintain the International Space Station.
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