
UPDATE: NASA will broadcast the SpaceX Crew-1 return mission from the International Space Station live Friday, which is postponed from tomorrow due to bad weather in the Gulf.
The ISS is rather crowded right now with 11 people on board and it’s rough finding enough places for everyone to sleep.
Relief will come when the Crew Dragon spacecraft, Resilience, departs with four astronauts on board this weekend. It is scheduled to undock from the space station on Friday at 5:55 p.m. ET. That will set up a splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico off the Florida Panhandle coast around 11:36 a.m. Saturday, weather permitting.
ORIGINAL STORY:
Apparently there are 11 people crammed into the International Space station after Friday’s manned launch. As a result, accommodations are a bit cramped and some will be sleep in atypical beds over the next four days.
Two commanders will sleep in their Crew Dragon capsules. That leaves three astronauts without a bed, prompting a set of makeshift arrangements dubbed “CASA” – an acronym for “Crew Alternate Sleep Accommodation” that also happens to mean “house” in Spanish.
My space-mad daughter watched excitedly as @Astro_Megan joined Shannon Walker on a crowded ISS. Look forward to the day I can show her a picture like this and it’s more than 50% women. https://t.co/ZfWxAYIoqo
— Ben Stovold (@followben) April 24, 2021
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s (JAXA) Soichi Noguchi and fellow Crew-1 astronauts Shannon Walker and Victor Glover, both of NASA, will take the CASA beds. Noguchi will sleep in the astronaut gym, Walker will sleep in the Columbus module and Glover will rest in the airlock, NASA public affairs officer Marie Lewis said during the Crew-2 launch webcast on Friday (April 23).
Hopefully they won’t blow Glover out the airlock…