Dr. Norishige Kanai, born December 5, 1976 in Tokyo, Japan, went into space aboard Soyuz MS-07 to the International Space Station in December 2015. He was part of the crews for Expeditions 54 and 55. In July 2015, he participated as an aquanaut in the Aquarius underwater laboratory as part of the NEEMO 20 crew.
Soyuz MS-08 crew (L-R): Ricky Arnold, Oleg Artemyev, Andrew Feustel
Mission patch
Soyuz MS-08, launched yesterday, March 21, 2018, is on its way to the International Space Station, carrying members of Expedition 55 and 56. Its crew consists of Commander Oleg Artemyev (Roscosmos), Andrew Feustel and Richard "Ricky" Arnold, both of NASA. They will dock with the station tomorrow, March 23.
They will join the current crew, Anton Shkaplerov, Scott Tingle and Norishige Kanai, already on board.
Joe Acaba helps Scott Tingle during a fit test in his spacesuit.
Expedition 54 flight engineers Mark Vande Hei and Scott Tingle, NASA astronauts, completed the first spacewalk of 2018 yesterday, January 24, conducting maintenance and making repairs to the International Space Station. It was the third EVA for Vande Hei and the first for Tingle. They replaced a Latching End Effector (LEE), which is important in grappling visiting vehicles, on the Canadarm2, the robotic arm attached to the station. The EVA lasted 7 hours and 24 minutes.
This was the 206th EVA conducted for ISS assembly and maintenance. Astronauts have spent a total of 53 days, 13 hours and 49 minutes (no seconds?) working outside the station.
The next spacewalk is scheduled for this coming Monday, January 29, for Vande Hei and Norishige Kanai of JAXA.
Soyuz MS-07 launched today is taking three astronauts to the International Space Station. The crew consists of Anton Shkaplerov (Roscosmos), Scott Tingle (NASA) and Norishige Kanai (JAXA). The will dock with the ISS in about two days.
Randy Bresnik, Paolo Nespoli and Sergey Ryazanskiy landed a little after 3:30am EST today (2:30pm in Kazakhstan) completing their mission on the International Space Station. While on board, they performed many experiments, contributing to studies on microgravity's effect on the antibiotic resistance of E. coli, a baterial pathogen responsible for urinary tract infection, and growing larger versions of an important protein implicated in Parkison's Disease. This last example was developed by the Michael J. Fox Foundation with two other partners.
They were launched July 28, 2017 aboard Soyuz MS-05.
Expedition 54 will continue with 3 crew members, Commander Alexander Misurkin, Mark Vande Hei and Joe Acaba, until this Sunday when the next crew arrives: Anton Shkaplerov (Roscosmos), Scott Tingle (NASA) and Norishige Kanai (JAXA).
