As his year-long mission aboard the International Space Station draws to a close, Expedition 46 commander Scott Kelly of NASA gives a final in-flight news conference with U.S. media on Feb. 25. Kelly and cosmonauts Mikhail Kornienko and Sergey Volkov are preparing for their return to Earth on March 1, U.S. time, aboard the Soyuz TMA-18M spacecraft.
Mission Reports
Station astronauts install new cameras on successful spacewalk
Two astronauts floated outside the International Space Station Thursday and installed two new cameras on the front of the lab complex that will provide views of commercial crew ships during final approach and docking. The spacewalkers also replaced a faulty high-definition camera and closed a door that was jammed open on an external instrument.
Mission Reports
Live coverage: Dragon supply ship returns to Earth
A commercial Dragon cargo capsule is heading back to Earth Tuesday to conclude a 31-day stay at the International Space Station. The SpaceX-owned spacecraft was released from the station’s Canadian-built robotic arm at 10:59 a.m. EDT (1459 GMT), and the Dragon supply ship splashed down in the Pacific Ocean with nearly 3,400 pounds of cargo at 4:21 p.m. EDT (2021 GMT).
News
Trump budget aims to kick-start lunar exploration, cancels space telescope
The White House’s $19.9 billion NASA budget outline released Monday would continue development of NASA’s heavy-lift Space Launch System rocket and Orion crew capsule and begin the deployment of a mini-space station around the moon as soon as 2022, but the proposal would cancel WFIRST, a flagship-class astronomy mission planned for launch in the mid-2020s.