Six person ISS crew on it's way, and nomination of new NASA Admin

Just wanted to post a little something about a few things NASA related that you all might be interested in. The first is the news that the second half of the first 6 person Space Station Crew is on it's way! Soyuz TMA-15 launched today from Baiconure Cosmodrome, on it's way to a docking with ISS for the start of 6 person ops. This is big news for us, especially since we just started processing urine into potable water last week (my group was partially in charge of getting the toilet to work so it could ship urine to the processor). We did a lot of other work to prepare for six person ops, but this is probably the most visible of our contributions. Internationally, it has big implications because the crew will be made up of astronauts from all the space agencies participating in the ISS program. NASA, ESA (Europe), JAXA (Japan), Roscosmos, and CSA (Canada) will all now have astronauts on board, come Soyuz docking day.

The other thing worth mentioning is the nomination of Gen. Charles Bolden as NASA Administrator. Obama has made his pick, now it is up to Congress to confirm him. As a former Space Shuttle Astronaut, you would think he would be a great choice for the manned spaceflight crowd, but the fact is he is also very supportive of the additional goals of the space program. He has shown his support for manned exploration as well as the science programs of NASA, many of which were cut when NASA had to reorganize after budget cuts. He is also a big believer that the work NASA does today is what will influence the engineers and scientists of tomorrow. With Bolden at the helm, I can see him fighting for more funding for science programs, and maintaining current funding for exploration prgrams (which would all be a good thing).

Anyways, that is the big news from today for you.