Below is a NASA artist's rendering of the International
Space Station at Assembly Complete. I train the crew (astronauts
& cosmonauts) and the flight controllers (Mission Control Center -
Houston) on the avionics systems of the Station. This page, and the
links on it, are to provide you with information on the International
Space Station project and on space exploration in general. Any opinions
given on this page are mine, and mine alone; they are in no way to
be inferred as representing official policy of NASA or any other organization
mentioned herein.
The first module of the International Space
Station is Zarya, also known as the FGB (Functional Cargo Block).
Zarya is Russian for sunrise. Zarya is US paid for, but built
by Russia. Zarya rocketed into the sky at 06:40 GMT on Friday, November
20th, 1998. Below is a NASA artist's conception of Zarya.
Shortly after Zarya is inserted into
orbit, the Space Shuttle carried Unity (also known as Node 1) into
orbit. The Shuttle and her crew (STS-88) joined Zarya and
Unity
together, as shown below. Unity is shown as blue.
