October 25, 2000
Dwayne Brown
Headquarters, Washington DC
(Phone: 202/358-1726)
Eileen Hawley
Johnson Space Center, Houston, TX
(Phone: 281/483-5111)

Release: N00-51


NASA TELEVISION TO BROADCAST LAUNCH AND DOCKING OF FIRST SPACE STATION
RESIDENT CREW


NASA Television plans extensive coverage of the launch and docking of
the vehicle carrying the first resident crew to live aboard the
International Space Station (ISS).

The crew, Expedition One Commander Bill Shepherd, Soyuz Commander Yuri
Gidzenko and Flight Engineer Sergei Krikalev, is scheduled for launch at
approximately 2:53 a.m. EST, Oct. 31, atop a Soyuz rocket from the
Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The launch initiates a two-day flight
to the station, culminating in a docking on Nov. 2. Once docked to the
new facility, the crewmembers will begin a four-month stay, beginning
the permanent occupancy of the international complex.

Throughout the week and weekend, NASA TV will broadcast footage of the
crew's pre-launch preparations at Baikonur and other locations on the
NASA TV Video File at noon Eastern time.

On the day before launch, Oct. 30, NASA TV will replay the crew's final
pre-launch news conference from the cosmonaut crew quarters at Baikonur
at 5 a.m. EST, with subsequent replays at 8 a.m. and 10 a.m.

Launch coverage on Oct. 31 will begin at 2 a.m. EST, anchored from the
Russian Mission Control Center in Korolev, outside Moscow, and the ISS
Flight Control Room at NASA's Johnson Space Center, Houston, TX.

A post-launch news conference at the Russian Mission Control Center will
be conducted about 90 minutes after liftoff, with questions taken only
from reporters in Korolev. Coverage will continue with periodic
commentary and mission updates throughout the two days of the Expedition
One crew's free flight to the station.

Live coverage of docking to the ISS Zvezda Service Module will begin
about thirty minutes before the Soyuz linkup. The docking time on Nov. 2
is expected to be around 4:20 a.m. EST. A black-and-white camera on the
Soyuz should provide live TV of the docking itself. Approximately 90
minutes after docking, the Expedition One crew will open the hatch to
Zvezda, but no live TV will be available. A video replay of the historic
hatch opening may be provided by the crew on subsequent orbits through
Russian ground stations.

Once the Expedition crewmembers arrive on the station, commentary will
continue through the duration of their stay on orbit, some of which will
appear on NASA TV. The primary method for distributing mission
commentary will be through the human space flight website at
http://spaceflight.nasa.gov

or through the Mission Audio circuits to NASA Centers.

Air-to-ground conversations between the crewmembers and flight
controllers in Houston and Korolev will be distributed in real time on
Mission Audio circuits and as streaming audio on the human space flight
website.

Television will be sporadic during the course of the Expedition One
mission, transmitted through either Russian ground stations periodically
or by a slow-scan video system available through the ISS early S-band
communications system.

The crew is scheduled to return to Earth on the STS-102 mission to the
ISS, scheduled for launch in February 2001 to bring the Expedition Two
crew to the station.

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