posted 12-08-2009 08:14 AM            

My understanding is that one final (assembled) External Tank remains as the STS-133 Launch On Need mission. Were STS-135 approved, it would fly on Atlantis in 2011 and minus its own LON flight.

posted 12-08-2009 08:21 AM               

quote:

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Originally posted by issman1:
Of course, who would be the crew is subjective, but I think astronaut Chris Ferguson will likely be commander.

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posted 12-08-2009 03:43 PM               

Nobody would turn down an opportunity to fly, even if the shuttle were empty. But a flight to "bring home the trash" might not be worth the risk involved.

Why only four crew members?

posted 12-08-2009 04:06 PM               

As for why another flight? Several reasons:

• The PMM (modified MPLM) left at the station only partially relieves the storage issues on the ISS; taking down the trash may not be glamorous but it can make a world of a difference on-orbit.

• The station's downmass needs are not limited to trash; science results and broken equipment can be better handled by a shuttle than a Soyuz.

• Upmass: you can never overstock your supplies; with the room you free by removing trash, you can deliver supplies that will length the lifespan of the station.

quote:

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Originally posted by 328KF:
One more crew transfer?

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posted 12-09-2009 10:51 AM               

All good justification for the mission, but if things go south, it seems like a long time with 10 people on ISS waiting for the Russians to put up two more Soyuz ships.

Assuming the Soyuz does not fly with just one crew member aboard, each of those come up with minimum two crew members so at some point there would be 12 on ISS. Two shuttle crew come back with one Russian leaving 9 aboard. The next Soyuz comes up with two more and takes three back leaving eight crew members on ISS, and only six seats on the remaining Soyuz lifeboats. In this case it would seem they need three additional Soyuz.

I know there are a lot of smart folks there that can figure all of this out... my main concern would be the uncertainty of delivery schedule on the part of the Russians. They might want to have those additional ships pretty far along in production before they commit to this.

posted 12-09-2009 01:28 PM               

"CSCS capability will be higher than recent flights (STS-133 crew [size] helps even more). Projected CSCS with a immediate return of one Soyuz is at least 120 days. On orbit crew size would be nine."

Were STS-135 to launch in November 2010 or later (which is reasonable, given the timing of STS-133 in September), then the mission would arrive to the six-member Expedition 26.

Soyuz can launch with a crew of one (as evidence by Roscosmos' deal with Space Adventures to fly a dedicated space tourism mission, with one veteran cosmonaut and two spaceflight participants). With the nominal six-person crew on the station, Roscosmos has at any given time two Soyuz spacecraft in preparation for the next crew rotations, launched three months apart.

posted 02-09-2010 12:29 PM               

Gerstenmaier said Atlantis will be readied with a loaded multi-purpose logistics module (MPLM) in its payload bay to support the STS-133 mission as a launch-on-need contingency vehicle, but that was to protect the International Space Station in the case that it was called into service as a safe haven for the STS-133 crew.

posted 02-14-2010 04:34 AM               

SpaceLaunchNews.com has learned that NASA will announce an extra space shuttle flight to be added late this fall or early-2011, according to a source at the Johnson Space Center near Houston.

The much anticipated announcement could come in the coming weeks or sooner.

posted 02-14-2010 06:28 PM               

quote:

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Originally posted by Robert Pearlman:
STS-133 remains the final shuttle flight

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posted 06-29-2010 01:22 AM               

quote:

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Originally posted by Robert Pearlman:
To the best of my knowledge, NASA is not currently budgeting for the funds to turnaround Discovery after STS-133.

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It certainly wouldn't make any sense to prepare Discovery to fly STS-135, when Atlantis will have already been prepared for fly a LON mission for STS-134. The extra expense of preparing a second orbiter for STS-135 (when only one is needed) wouldn't be a wise use of their budget.

posted 07-03-2010 01:15 PM               

quote:

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Originally posted by Delta7:
There isn't likely to be a rookie on STS-135 should it fly.

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posted 07-03-2010 02:22 PM               

If recent history holds, then it will be an all veteran crew and the MS's will probably be recently flown Expedition members since they'll already be familiar with stowing supplies aboard station. They'll probably also have flown as Flight Engineers on Soyuz since any rescue craft would launch with one cosmonaut.

posted 07-03-2010 02:27 PM               

If STS-135 does fly, the consensus seems to be that it will have four crew members in order to maximize the uplift capability.

Personally, I think either Chris Ferguson or Lee Archambault would command. Doug Hurley would lead the list for pilot, followed by Butch Wilmore. The leading MS candidates in my opinion are T.J. Creamer, Mike Massimino, Megan McArthur, Steve Swanson, Daniel Tani, Rex Walheim, Sandra Magnus, Stan Love, Karen Nyberg (if she's available) and Tracy Caldwell-Dyson (who will return to earth in September, fresh from a 5 1/2 month tour aboard the ISS).

posted 07-30-2010 05:50 PM            

If I recall, NASA managers were saying they needed a definitive answer by August. The flight itself, if approved, has a NET launchdate of June 2011.