MOSCOW, October 31 (AVN) - Specialists of the Boeing Company working all over the world will provide technical assistance to the first crew of the International Space Station (ISS) at all stages of its orbital flight, Brewster Shaw, Boeing vice president and ISS programmes manager, said on Tuesday.
Boeing experts will do their best to ensure security of the crew on orbit and will provide comprehensive support to future expeditions to the ISS, Shaw said after the Russian-US crew lifted off from the Baikonur spaceport earlier in the day.
Technical support will be provided primarily by a group of Boeing experts working together with their Russian colleagues in the Flight Control Centre in the town of Korolyov outside Moscow, the Boeing press service said in a statement. Assistance will also be granted by Boeing centres in Houston, TX, Cangoa Park, CA, and Huntington Beach, CA, as well as the Kennedy Space Centre, FL.
The ISS is the biggest international space project ever. It involves 16 countries. The station is to be fully assembled in orbit by 2006, after which it will be able to host crews of up to seven people. The residential and working space onboard the station will make 1,303 cubic metres.
Currently, the ISS consists of three modules. Russia's Zvezda serves as a residential facility and an onboard control centre. Zarya provides additional energy for the station. Boeing's Unity is a docking module which will accept all segments of the station made in the USA. These segments will be brought into orbit together with the second long-term crew by the Discovery shuttle in February 2001.
The next spacecraft to be launched to the ISS is the US Endeavour shuttle. It will carry additional equipment for the station in November this year. In January 2001, a US space laboratory will be transported to the ISS.