Expedition 6

Mission objectives

Expedition 6 originally had NASA astronaut Donald A. Thomas assigned as flight engineer, but he was replaced by his backup, Don Pettit, due to health issues. The crew launched to the International Space Station in November 2002 on Space Shuttle Endeavour during mission STS-113. They were supposed to stay for four months, with the Expedition 7 crew arriving in March 2003 on Atlantis STS-114. Everything changed after the Columbia disaster on 1 February 2003, which grounded all shuttle flights indefinitely.

Instead of coming home in March, the crew remained on the station until May 2003. They returned to Earth on a Russian Soyuz TMA-1 capsule, touching down just after 10 p.m. EDT on 3 May 2003. This was the first time U.S. astronauts landed in a Soyuz, though U.S. tourist Dennis Tito had done so in 2001. The replacement crew, Expedition 7, was reduced to just two members and launched on Soyuz TMA-2.

With the shuttle fleet grounded for up to two years, Russian Soyuz and Progress spacecraft handled all logistical support for the station. Russian Mission Control reported around 2:45 a.m. on 4 May that helicopters had reached the crew and all three were in good health. The capsule landed about 276 miles from its intended landing zone.

Spacewalks

The Expedition 6 team performed two spacewalks, both leaving from the Quest Airlock in American suits. Although the schedule initially called for just one, a second was added on April 8 to get ready for later construction work. Pettit, not originally assigned to walk, replaced Budarin after a medical issue removed him days earlier. Together, Bowersox and Pettit logged 13 hours and 17 minutes outside the station.

Did You Know?

• Expedition 6 is the subject of the book Too Far From Home: A Story of Life and Death in Space, by Chris Jones.
• A dramatised account of Expedition 6 is told in Expedition 6, a play by actor/playwright Bill Pullman.
• The play was scheduled to run at San Francisco's Magic Theater through 7 October 2007.