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Expedition 1
Expedition 1 was the first long-duration expedition to the International Space Station (ISS). The three-person crew stayed aboard the station for 136 days, from 2 November 2000 to 19 March 2001. It was the beginning of an uninterrupted human presence on the station which continues as of 2025.
The official start of the expedition occurred when the crew docked to the station on 2 November 2000, aboard the Russian spacecraft Soyuz TM-31, which had launched on 31 October 2000 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. During their mission, the Expedition 1 crew activated various systems on board the station, unpacked equipment that had been delivered, and hosted three visiting Space Shuttle crews and two uncrewed Russian Progress resupply vehicles. The crew was very busy throughout the mission, which was declared a success.
The three visiting Space Shuttles brought equipment, supplies, and key components of the space station. The first of these, STS-97, docked in early December 2000, and brought the first pair of large U.S. photovoltaic arrays, which increased the station's power capabilities fivefold. The second visiting shuttle mission was STS-98, which was docked in mid-February 2001 and delivered the US$1.4 billion research module Destiny, which increased the mass of the station beyond that of Mir for the first time. Mid-March 2001 saw the final shuttle visit of the expedition, STS-102, whose main purpose was to exchange the Expedition 1 crew with the next three-person long-duration crew, Expedition 2. The expedition ended when Discovery undocked from the station on 18 March 2001.
The Expedition 1 crew consisted of an American commander and two Russians. The commander, Bill Shepherd, had been in space three times before, all on shuttle missions which lasted at most a week. The Russians, Yuri Gidzenko and Sergei K. Krikalev, both had previous long-duration spaceflights on Mir, with Krikalev having spent over a full year in space.
The commander, Bill Shepherd, was a former Navy SEAL, whose only spaceflights were on shuttle missions, and at the beginning of the mission his total time in space was about two weeks. Questions had been raised by the Russian space agency about the choice of Shepherd as mission commander due to his lack of experience. Flight engineer Sergei Krikalev had spent over a year in orbit, mostly on Mir, and would become the first person to visit the ISS twice. He had felt excitement to have been one of the first people to enter the Zarya module (the first component of the space station) in 1998, during STS-88, and was looking forward to returning. Yuri Gidzenko was designated commander and pilot of the two-day Soyuz mission to the station, had one previous spaceflight, which was a 180-day stay aboard Mir.
Shepherd was only the second U.S. astronaut to be launched in a Russian spacecraft, the first being Norman Thagard, who launched on Soyuz TM-21 to visit Mir in 1995. Shepherd expected one of the biggest challenges for the ISS would be the compatibility of technologies between Russian and U.S.
The first component of the International Space Station was the Zarya module, which was launched uncrewed on 20 November 1998. Between this launch and the arrival of the first crew, five crewed Space Shuttle missions from the U.S. and two uncrewed Russian flights expanded the station and prepared it for human habitation.
Four of the five Shuttle flights focused primarily on delivering and unpacking substantial cargo for future crews. STS-88 launched on 4 December 1998, delivered the Unity module, the first component of the US Orbital Segment (USOS) during the mission, the crew spent several hours unpacking and setting up both Unity and Zarya. Krikalev, who would be a Flight Engineer on Expedition 1 flew on STS-88 and together with Shuttle Commander Robert D. Cabana became the first two people to jointly enter Unity and later Zarya.
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Expedition 1 AI simulator
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Expedition 1
Expedition 1 was the first long-duration expedition to the International Space Station (ISS). The three-person crew stayed aboard the station for 136 days, from 2 November 2000 to 19 March 2001. It was the beginning of an uninterrupted human presence on the station which continues as of 2025.
The official start of the expedition occurred when the crew docked to the station on 2 November 2000, aboard the Russian spacecraft Soyuz TM-31, which had launched on 31 October 2000 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. During their mission, the Expedition 1 crew activated various systems on board the station, unpacked equipment that had been delivered, and hosted three visiting Space Shuttle crews and two uncrewed Russian Progress resupply vehicles. The crew was very busy throughout the mission, which was declared a success.
The three visiting Space Shuttles brought equipment, supplies, and key components of the space station. The first of these, STS-97, docked in early December 2000, and brought the first pair of large U.S. photovoltaic arrays, which increased the station's power capabilities fivefold. The second visiting shuttle mission was STS-98, which was docked in mid-February 2001 and delivered the US$1.4 billion research module Destiny, which increased the mass of the station beyond that of Mir for the first time. Mid-March 2001 saw the final shuttle visit of the expedition, STS-102, whose main purpose was to exchange the Expedition 1 crew with the next three-person long-duration crew, Expedition 2. The expedition ended when Discovery undocked from the station on 18 March 2001.
The Expedition 1 crew consisted of an American commander and two Russians. The commander, Bill Shepherd, had been in space three times before, all on shuttle missions which lasted at most a week. The Russians, Yuri Gidzenko and Sergei K. Krikalev, both had previous long-duration spaceflights on Mir, with Krikalev having spent over a full year in space.
The commander, Bill Shepherd, was a former Navy SEAL, whose only spaceflights were on shuttle missions, and at the beginning of the mission his total time in space was about two weeks. Questions had been raised by the Russian space agency about the choice of Shepherd as mission commander due to his lack of experience. Flight engineer Sergei Krikalev had spent over a year in orbit, mostly on Mir, and would become the first person to visit the ISS twice. He had felt excitement to have been one of the first people to enter the Zarya module (the first component of the space station) in 1998, during STS-88, and was looking forward to returning. Yuri Gidzenko was designated commander and pilot of the two-day Soyuz mission to the station, had one previous spaceflight, which was a 180-day stay aboard Mir.
Shepherd was only the second U.S. astronaut to be launched in a Russian spacecraft, the first being Norman Thagard, who launched on Soyuz TM-21 to visit Mir in 1995. Shepherd expected one of the biggest challenges for the ISS would be the compatibility of technologies between Russian and U.S.
The first component of the International Space Station was the Zarya module, which was launched uncrewed on 20 November 1998. Between this launch and the arrival of the first crew, five crewed Space Shuttle missions from the U.S. and two uncrewed Russian flights expanded the station and prepared it for human habitation.
Four of the five Shuttle flights focused primarily on delivering and unpacking substantial cargo for future crews. STS-88 launched on 4 December 1998, delivered the Unity module, the first component of the US Orbital Segment (USOS) during the mission, the crew spent several hours unpacking and setting up both Unity and Zarya. Krikalev, who would be a Flight Engineer on Expedition 1 flew on STS-88 and together with Shuttle Commander Robert D. Cabana became the first two people to jointly enter Unity and later Zarya.