Tim Peake the Astronaut
In 2010, following his initial 4 years with the Army Air Corps as a Gazelle helicopter pilot and 12 years as instructor and test pilot on the AH-64 Apache helicopter, Tim graduated as an Astronaut with the European Space Agency.
On 11th December 2015 Tim became the first Britain in space when he was assigned to Expedition 46 to the International Space Station (ISS). Tim launched on the Russian Soyuz TMA-16M rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan with fellow astronauts, Sergey Volkov, Mikhail Kornienko, Yuri Malenchenko and Timothy Kopra, for the 4 hour flight to join Commander Scott Kelly who would be remaining on ISS while the earlier Expeditions' crews, whom Tim and team were replacing, departed for earth.
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| ISS Expedition 46 patch, 2015 |
The 46 icon in the foreground of the patch represents the forty-sixth expedition mission to the International Space Station. Earth is depicted at the top with the flags of the countries of origin of the crew members: the United States, Russia and the United Kingdom. The Union flag of the UK is displayed in a position of prominence in recognition of the significance of the first British ESA astronaut to fly in space. The outer border is in the shape of a triangle with an unbroken border, symbolising the infinite journey of discovery for past, present and future space explorers. The names of the six Expedition 46 astronauts and cosmonauts are shown in the border.
Tim's mission of gravity free experiments and even a space walk, concluded on 1 March 2016 when he bounced down to earth landing on the Kazakh Steppe, a vast region of open grassland in northern Kazakhstan. His was possibly a harder landing than this counterparts on Apollo missions I remember from my youth landing in the Ocean! or better still that experience by the Shuttle crews of the 1980s.
The International Space Station (ISS)
NASA's idea of the space station was first publicly shared in 1963 at the most unlikely venue, the Ideal Home Exhibition! The space station would be the springboard to the planets but it took until 1984 for President Reagan to actually authorise NASA to begin work on a space station and to 'do it within a decade'.
The Soviet space program, having lost the race to the moon, meanwhile, had been launching space stations for 20 years. Their Salyut series of space stations first launched in 1971were followed up with the Mir (peace) space station in 1986. Mir presaged a new capability for keeping people in space, using the building block approach to expand the facility into a fully equipped laboratory.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union on 25 December 1991, Russia lost territory, natural resources, manpower, factories and government facilities now located in what, almost overnight, became foreign countries. There was just enough money to maintain the Mir programme but their shuttle Buran was abandoned. In June 1992, President George Bush of USA and President Boris Yeltsin of Russia signed an agreement pledging cooperation through Shuttle missions to Mir. This resulted in the setting up of frequent ferrying flights of Russian cosmonauts aboard the Shuttle and Americans aboard a Soyuz between Earth and the Mir Space Station.
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| International Space Station ISS (Phase 2007) |
This relaxation in political tension led in 1993 to Bill Clinton's presidential decision requesting NASA bring in Russian expertise and forge a new working relationship within a five-team partnership comprising the USA, Russia, Europe, Japan and Canada to create a truly International Space Station - the ISS.
ISS Phase One - missions to Mir. Following agreement to merge their efforts, NASA and its Russian counterpart set to work planning a series of missions that would prepare the way for assembly of an international laboratory in space - one hosing astronauts from several countries.
ISS Phase Two - the assembly. By 1995 the scale of the ISS had grown to 75 assembly flights in a complex schedule of launches planned to start in November 1997 and finish in June 2002. By 1997 this had been paired back to 45 and the final configuration settled. The agreement was for a 'T' configuration for the ISS modules with 8 solar panels, 4 extending from each end of the top of the "T' called the truss assembly. Nodes would be sighted down the length of the 'T' connecting the European Colombus and Japanese JEM modules to the US and Russian modules which were the first to assembled.
The first module launched was planned to be built by Boeing in the US, but as costs spiralled NASA pushed for Boeing to cancel their build and pay Russia for a replacement. In November 1998 the Russian built Zarya (Sunrise) model was launched. Visually similar to the Mir core module and designed primarily for living and working in, it would initially serve as a powerhouse and tug.
The second ISS element lifted into space in December 1998, was the first of 3 nodes called Unity, it was the first piece of US hardware. The nodes are places where engineering and systems equipment are located while doubling as connectors between modules and other structures.
The third element was the Russian-owned Service Module Zvezda (Star), launched in July 2000, delayed 2 years by holdups in manufacturing and postponed launch dates.
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| Annotated with ISS Phases Two to Three |
ISS Phase Three - permanent habitation. The arrival of the Solar Arrays in December 2000 would enable the station to provide a permanent home and work environment for its occupants. February 2001 saw the Space Shuttle Atlantis attach the 13 tonne US Destiny science laboratory to the Unity Node delivered 3 years earlier. Additional trusses and solar arrays followed.
ISS Phase Four - final assembly. With the anticipation high for an early completion of the giant station, hopes were dashed when the only vehicle capable of transporting large loads into space was grounded. The loss of the Shuttle Columbia in 2003 held up assembly for almost four years, while the Russians ferried crews back and forth to ISS.
In August 2007 Endeavour was the first Space Shuttle since 2003 to resume flights to the space station and enable the final assembly to be completed. Between 2007 and 2011 the final elements comprising, 4 further solar arrays, the final 2 nodes, the European Lab - Columbus Orbital Facility, Japan's Jem modules, Canada's remote arm, and the Science Power Platform were all delivered, completing - for now at least - the ISS assembly.
The Model
I was amazed to learn that anyone had created a scale model of ISS, so was thrilled to lay my hands on this Dragon 1:400 scale kit, even if it was based on its assembly as at 2007, prior to the Shuttle flights resuming after the 2003 Columbia tragedy.
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| Dragon's 1:400 Scale Kit and my Haynes Owner's Workshop Manual to assist in construction! |
This kit, therefore, shows ISS as it would have looked after completion of Phase Three rather than how Tim would have seen it when he arrived in 2015.
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| Just need to put it together now |
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| The finished model before adding the CGI background |
Title: International Space Station (Phase 2007)
Number: 1102
Scale: 1:400
Type: Full kit
Released: 2020 | Initial release - new tool
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