ISS Awards 2016
The sixth ISS Awards ceremony was held on 11 May in ESTEC’s Erasmus Centre. This year’s edition acknowledged the expertise, professionalism and dedication of 38 people who contributed to the success of Europe’s involvement in the International Space Station (ISS) programme during increments 41 to 44.
“According to an old saying in space operations, future successes rely on the people of today and the achievements of yesterday. Today, we are here to celebrate both,” said the ceremony’s host, Markus Landgraf from ESA’s Strategic Planning Office.
The trophy itself is a piece of ESA’s history – it is a bronze casting of astronaut Hans Schlegel’s Extra Vehicular Activity glove, used for the installation of the Columbus module on the Space Station in 2008.
“We particularly want to recognise the importance of the ground crew in supporting the work of the ISS,” said David Parker, the Director of Human Spaceflight and Robotic Operations, who joined via videolink from Paris.
Mission managers Alexander Nitsch and Roland Luettgens presented the award to six winners out of thirteen nominations from a wide variety of types of contribution. ESA individuals and teams, as well as European industrial partners, were all eligible to be in the list of nominees.
“We just happened to be on console when the emergency occurred,” said Ivano Verzola, accompanied by his colleague Andre Krupke, both part of the False IFHX alarm team that won one of the awards. “Operating Columbus is a real team achievement, and we share this award with all the Columbus Flight Control Team and all the people working with us at Columbus Control Centre,” he added.
Part of the IRISS operations and logistics team, Rosa Sapone was proud to receive the award after a very intense period of work for her and the members of her team. “I was the ESA Lead for Logistics and Maintenance for the short-duration mission of Andreas Mogensen. It was a huge job but extremely satisfying,” she said.
The award ceremony provided a fitting tribute to the career of Raimund Lentzen, a veteran of astronaut support and coordination, who is about to retire after 30 years of service. “I feel especially honoured to receive the award this time, knowing that so many people contributed to the work that we do,” he said.
INCREMENT 41/42
Winners: DLR 'Blue Dot' mission team (Volker Schmid, Freya Scheffler-Kayser, Johannes Weppler, Andrea Groß): science is an important part of an astronaut’s mission to the ISS. This team liaised very effectively with ESA to strengthen the scientific content of Alexander Gerst’s 'Blue Dot' mission.
False IFHX alarm team (Roseline Neri, Maksims Baklanenko, Andre Krupke, Ivano Verzola): An ammonia leak that turned out to be a false alarm led to a partial shutdown of the ISS. The team safely powered down Columbus and re-established its operations once the emergency was over, showing exceptional dedication and world-class capabilities.
ATV Shadow team (Franck Gangnery, Emiliano Micaloni, Laurent Arzel, David Allain, Morgane Saint-Macary): This team was instrumental to the success of the ATV programme. From operations planning to acting as representatives in various ISS boards, from monitoring ongoing anomalies to maintaining the qualified status of the ATV Control Centre, they professionally supported the day-to-day activities of all mission directors since ATV-2.
Nominees: PK-4 operations core team (Maksims Baklanenko, Lourdes Oro Marot, Daria Margiotta, Cécile Thévenot, Anaïs Llodra-Perez); ATV Cargo operational team (Mike Steinkopf, Colleen Boggs, Davide Negri, Mauro Signetti); Simon Challis; Emilio de Pasquale.
INCREMENT 43/44
Winners: IRISS operations and logistics team (Petra Mittler, Rosa Sapone, Warren Chell, Eric Istasse): the success of Andreas Mogensen’s short-duration mission was made possible through the logistics, planning and operations support from this team. They had to deal with several last-minute changes to mission duration and had to keep adapting mission content for maximum scientific return.
Stefan Carl: Stefan excelled in coordinating all management support activities for the IRISS mission. This mission had no NASA involvement, meaning that ESA had to provide functions that are normally assigned to NASA, all of which were performed by Stefan.
Raimund Lentzen: Raimund was recognised for his outstanding contribution and dedication to human spaceflight. Over more than three decades, he flawlessly organised launch and landing campaigns and provided support to astronauts in space and their families on the ground.
Nominees: Engineering team (Marco Schena, Stephan Hinderer, Richard Braeken, Alessandra Stragapede); Direct return team (Stephane Ghiste, Dmitry Churkin, Raimund Lentzen, Mark Mouret, Peter Sinnwell); Manuel Martim Alfonso (deceased).
