The SC team successfully completed their first day of propellant loading on Friday. Saturday is a preparation day for the second day of fueling, which takes place on Sunday. The Breeze M is also making its way to its fueling station for fueling on Sunday before making its way back to Hall 101 for the beginning of Joint Operations next week. With limited access to 92A-50 during fueling operations, a handful of people made their way to Kurkut. Kurkut is a memorial dedicated to a famous Kazakh poet and musician credited with inventing the kobyz, the national instrument of Kazakhstan. The poet is buried near the memorial. After a very interesting and educational hour touring the museum and walking around the site, we hopped back into the bus and made a stop in town for some pizza before heading back to base camp.

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Thursday night featured a duo of events for the Launch Team: an international friendly volleyball game (SS/Loral versus Khrunichev) and an international cuisine. The report has come back that the Russians narrowly defeated the Americans in a tightly fought battle. Unfortunately there is no photographic record of this match, as there arose some unexpected camera difficulties. A rematch will take place sometime in the near future, as our colleagues from DB Salyut and ZERKT arrive this weekend and will be able to supplement the Khrunichev squad. As Loral and Khrunichev were battling it out on the volleyball court, ILS was cooking up a storm at the Polyot kitchen in preparation for burrito night in appreciation of all of our Pinkerton guards. Burrito night was a resounding success and everyone’s stomach wished that the food was not quite so good, since more than one person left the table with an over-full belly.

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The SC arrived right on schedule on Tuesday. Due to some extremely windy conditions, it arrived at the processing facility early the next morning, where it was unpacked and prepared for the Fitcheck with the adapter. After a successful Fitcheck on Wednesday, the SC made its way into Hall 103A for standalone operations. We will welcome the propulsion team and say good bye to some of our colleagues with a barbeque on Sunday.

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The majority of the Sirius FM-5 campaign team landed in Baikonur just after a rare rain shower on Saturday afternoon. We were met by a cool breeze and a gorgeous day. The days have remained cool and sunny and we hope that this uncharacteristically fine weather holds for our Memorial Day barbeque this evening and spacecraft arrival tomorrow.

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