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Space station skipper on loss: 'I was numb'
By Richard Stenger
(CNN) -- In their first public comments since the Columbia shuttle catastrophe, the international space station residents expressed grief Tuesday for lost comrades but said space exploration must go forward and they would stay in orbit for a year if necessary. "My first reaction was pure shock. I was numb and could not believe that it was happening," said station captain Ken Bowersox. His crew mate Don Pettit had played chess via radio and e-mail with shuttle pilot William "Willie" McCool during Columbia's two-week mission in orbit. "When we first heard, we did not know the condition of the crew, and we were hoping there would be survivors," Pettit said. When the station crew learned that none of the seven shuttle astronauts survived, "that's when the magnitude of the event really hit me." Days later, after watching a memorial service at the Johnson Space Center in Texas, the group rang the ship's bell seven times in honor of the fallen astronauts. After the ceremony, they unloaded an unmanned Progress supply ship docked to the station, packed with fresh fruit, letters from home and three tons of supplies. "Here on the station our emotions tend to be a little amplified," Bowersox said. "Each of us had time to shed some tears, but now it's time to move forward." Bowersox and Pettit, both U.S. astronauts, and Nikolai Budarin, a Russian cosmonaut, were expected to wrap up a four-month stay at the station in March. They were to return on the space shuttle Atlantis, but the entire fleet was grounded indefinitely after the loss of Columbia on February 1. With unmanned Russian Progress cargo ships providing periodic loads of fuel and supplies, the crew could stay much longer. "If they need us to stay a year, that's fine," Bowersox said. "We like living on the space station, and we feel comfortable that we have a way home." Two or three cosmonauts are expected to visit in April, bringing a fresh Soyuz capsule, which serves as an emergency lifeboat for station residents. In case the United States, Russia and other station partners decide to leave the orbiting outpost unoccupied, the station crew could return in the Soyuz. "A big part of our training in Russia was using the Soyuz for descent," Bowersox said. Earlier Tuesday, a Progress spacecraft boosted the station about six miles higher in its orbit. The 450-ton station sinks about 650 feet (200 meters) each day due to the effects of gravity. Often the more powerful thrusters on visiting space shuttles lift the station. But with the U.S. orbiters out of service, Russian vessels have become the lifeline to the orbiting outpost. The Progress, which docked to the station a week ago, fired its thrusters for about 20 minutes to lift the station to an orbit about 246 miles (396 kilometers) high, according to Russian mission control.
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