Houston, we have a podcast. Welcome to the official podcast of the NASA Johnson Space Center,

episode 73, The International Space Station begins, part two.

I'm Gary Jordan and I'll be your host today.

On this podcast we bring in the experts,

NASA scientists, engineers, and astronauts,

all to let you know the coolest information

about what's going on right here at NASA.

So today is another very special episode

because we're celebrating the 20th anniversary of the

beginning of the International Space Station, the ISS. A critical mission in

this story is STS 88. It's the shuttle mission that brought the Unity Module to join the first element Zaria in space.

It was the first ISS Assembly mission for the space shuttle,

the first time ISS elements joined together,

and the first space walks for ISS elements joined together and the first spacewalks for ISS assembly and maintenance.

STS 88 launched on December 4th and returned December 15th, 1998.

So to tell this story, we're bringing in Jerry Ross.

He's a former astronaut and flew with Mr. Cabana, Mr. Bob Cabana, the commander, and

currently the director of the Kennedy Space Center on STS 88.

Ross went out with astronaut Jim Newman back during the mission for the first three spacewalks

of ISS assembly and Maintenance.

To give you some idea of how cool that is, we're over 200 now for ISS assembly and maintenance

spacewalks at the time of this recording.

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