SUBMITTED BY ARTHUR N1ORC - AMSAT A/C #31468

*ISS Progress 24 to Depart, ISS Progress 26 to Launch *

ISS015-E-17052 --- The Great Salt Lake in Utah Image above: The Great Salt Lake in Utah is featured in this image photographed by an Expedition 15 crew member on the International Space Station. Image credit: NASA

TO VIEW IMAGE GO TO: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html

The Expedition 15 crew spent Monday preparing for the departure of the ISS Progress 24 (P24) cargo craft and the arrival of the ISS Progress 26.

Commander Fyodor Yurchikhin removed a Local Temperature Sensor Switching Unit and computer memory from P24. Flight Engineer Oleg Kotov repressurized the station's atmosphere with oxygen from tanks in the P24. The cargo craft will undock from the Pirs docking compartment on Aug. 1, burning up in the Earth’s atmosphere as it deorbits.

P26 is scheduled to launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 1:34 p.m. EDT Thursday, Aug. 2. It is scheduled to dock with the station Sunday, Aug. 5, at about 2:38 p.m. The crew trained on the manual TORU docking system controls Monday in preparation for the docking of P26. The manual system would be used in the unlikely event the automated Kurs system should experience difficulty.

Flight Engineer Clay Anderson packed items to be returned to Earth aboard Endeavour when it completes the STS-118 mission. Endeavour is set to launch on Aug. 7 and dock with the station on Aug. 9.

+ Read more about the ISS Progress 26 Launch http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition15/exp15_progress26_advancer.html + Read more about Expedition 15 http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition15/index.html + View crew daily timelines http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/timelines/index.html