Astronaut’s message during DropCoal installation on the International Space Station

The DropCoal experiment, developed by Romanian InSpace Engineering, has been operational for two weeks on the International Space Station. NASA astronaut Donald Pettit installed the DropCoal on November 14th in the ICE Cubes Facility in the European Columbus module of the International Space Station. The installation went smoothly, and with the support of ESA and NASA, we are excited to bring the message of the NASA astronaut Don Pettit to the Romanian public, recorded at the time of installation.

On November 15th, the device was powered on for the first time from the command center at RISE. This moment marked the beginning of a complex commissioning process in which the functionality of all systems was independently confirmed. This allowed the team of engineers at RISE’s mission control centre to perform the first fully automated coalescence experiment on the Station. The experiment succeeded on this first attempt, and we are able to share a compressed version of this video.

After this commissioning process ends, the operators will begin the planned procedures for conducting the experiments, following the requirements outlined by the team of scientific researchers, led by INFLPR. The results of the experiments will be analyzed in detail, providing solid knowledge with impact in space exploration: from the administration of drugs to astronauts, to water recycling or refueling of spacecraft. 

Yestedary DropCoal was featured on ESA’s website with the image below.

DropCoal – 1st Automated Experiment on the International Space Station

You can also find our experiment mentioned on NASA’s website:

DropCoal fully integrated, before performing the mechanical, electrical and software interface tests at Space Application Services. An ICE Cubes Facility engineering model was used, identical to the one installed on the ISS.

DropCoal was funded by the European Space Agency and it was fully developed by Romanian InSpace Engineering to host a scientific experiment. DropCoal is an orbital laboratory for studying how two droplets of different liquids behave in microgravity. The mission was proposed by a group of researchers from the National Institute for Laser, Plasma and Radiation Physics, which coordinated the leadership of the scientific team of the project. The findings of this experiment have particular implications for long-term missions, from the administration of drugs to astronauts to fueling rockets.