NASA Astronaut Nichole Ayers Expedition 72 Update | International Space Station

NASA Astronaut Nichole Ayers: Expedition 72 Update | International Space Station

Expedition 72 flight engineer and NASA astronaut Nichole Ayers: "As we flew over the beautiful waters of Southern Florida and the Caribbean, I snapped this photo. It encapsulates the International Space Station, our Crew Dragon, the Canadian Space Agency robotic arm (Canadarm2), and Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus cargo spacecraft."

"What a cool image of the cooperation it takes to make space exploration happen! And who doesn’t love the beautiful colors of the Caribbean??"

Sending the Northrop Grumman Cygnus cargo spacecraft over the Pacific

Closing the hatch of the Northrop Grumman Cygnus cargo spacecraft

Packing up the Northrop Grumman Cygnus cargo spacecraft

Expedition 72 Flight Engineers Nichole Ayers and Anne McClain closing the hatch of the Northrop Grumman Cygnus cargo spacecraft

Expedition 72 flight engineer and NASA astronaut Nichole Ayers update: "Last week we packed up Cygnus (pic 4), closed the hatch (pics 3 & 5), and sent the final depart command to fire its thrusters, sending it off over the Pacific (pic 2)."
"All went smoothly, and now we’ve got some extra space for new science and hardware!"

Astronaut Nichole Ayers NASA Biography:
https://www.nasa.gov/people/nasa-astronaut-nichole-ayers
https://www.nasa.gov/humans-in-space/astronauts/nasa-astronaut-nichole-ayers/

Expedition 72 Updates:

https://blogs.nasa.gov/spacestation/

Expedition 72 Crew

Station Commander: Roscosmos cosmonaut Alexey Ovchinin (Russia)
Roscosmos (Russia) Flight Engineers: Ivan Vagner, Kirill Peskov
NASA Flight Engineers: Don Pettit, Anne McClain, Nichole Ayers 

JAXA Flight Engineer: Takuya Onishi

An international partnership of space agencies provides and operates the elements of the International Space Station (ISS). The principals are the space agencies of the United States, Russia, Europe, Japan, and Canada.

Learn more about the important research being operated on Station:
https://www.nasa.gov/iss-science

For more information about STEM on Station:
https://www.nasa.gov/stemonstation

Image Credit: NASA's Johnson Space Center (JSC)
Image Dates: March 31-April 1, 2025

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