Expedition 75 Welcomes Crew-13 and Preps for Crew-12 Departure
NASA Science ·
Expedition 75 is in the middle of a crew swap aboard the International Space Station as four new crew members get used to life in microgravity and another quartet prepares for its return to Earth. The 11 crew members have been busy packing and unpacking the two SpaceX Dragon spacecraft docked to the orbital outpost’s Harmony module and preparing for upcoming cargo mission activities. The post Expedition 75 Welcomes Crew-13 and Preps for Crew-12 Departure appeared first on NASA Science .
Expedition 75 is in the middle of a crew swap aboard the International Space Station as four new crew members get used to life in microgravity and another quartet prepares for its return to Earth. The 11 crew members have been busy packing and unpacking the two SpaceX Dragon spacecraft docked to the orbital outpost’s Harmony module and preparing for upcoming cargo mission activities.
New Expedition 75 crew members Jessica Watkins and Luke Delaney of NASA, Josh Kutryk of CSA (Canadian Space Agency), and Sergey Teteryatnikov of Roscosmos have been living and working on the space station since Thursday, Oct. 1. They began their mission as NASA’s SpaceX Crew-13 after launching aboard a SpaceX Dragon and docking to Harmony’s forward port on the orbital outpost the same day. The four crewmates have been unpacking Dragon and familiarizing themselves with space station systems as they begin a six-month space research mission.
Now, the SpaceX Crew-12 quartet, which has been aboard the orbital outpost since Feb. 14 , is packing up for its departure scheduled for 8:05 a.m. EDT on Wednesday, Oct. 7. NASA astronauts Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway will respectively command and pilot Dragon alongside mission specialists Sophie Adenot of ESA (European Space Agency) and Andrey Fedyaev of Roscosmos. The foursome will undock from Harmony’s space-facing port then orbit Earth for just over a day inside Dragon. Crew-12 will reenter Earth’s atmosphere then parachute inside the spacecraft to a splashdown in the Pacific Ocean at 11:34 a.m. on Thursday, Oct. 8, ending a nearly eight-month stay in space.
Roscosmos cosmonaut Pyotr Dubrov accepted command of the International Space Station from Meir on Sunday, Oct. 4, during a traditional change of command ceremony. Dubrov will be staying in space with flight engineers Anna Kikina of Roscosmos and Anil Menon of NASA until spring 2027.
The next spacecraft to depart from the orbiting complex will be Northrop Grumman’s uncrewed Cygnus XL resupply ship which has been attached to the Unity module since April 13 . NASA flight engineers Menon and Hathaway loaded trash and discarded gear inside Cygnus XL on Monday. The cargo spacecraft is scheduled to be released from the station into Earth orbit with the Canadarm2 robotic arm at the end of the week.
Soon after that, SpaceX will launch Dragon on its 35 th commercial resupply mission to deliver science and supplies to the Expedition 75 crew. Kutryk on Monday studied tools and procedures to monitor Dragon’s approach and rendezvous following its upcoming launch from Florida. Meir reorganized the Kibo laboratory module where some of Dragon’s cargo will be stowed after its arrival.
Learn more about station activities by following the space station blog , @space_station on X, as well as the ISS Facebook and ISS Instagram accounts.
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The post Expedition 75 Welcomes Crew-13 and Preps for Crew-12 Departure appeared first on NASA Science .