STS-104 MISSION ARCHIVE Updated: 07/25/01 (COMPLETE) Space Station Assembly Mission 7A: Joint airlock By William Harwood CBS News/Kennedy Space Center The following copy originally was posted on the Current Mission space page at http://cbsnews.cbs.com/network/news/space/index.html. Comments, suggestions and corrections welcome! TABLE OF CONTENTS Shuttle crew participates in dress rehearsal countdown (06/29/01) Astronauts arrive for start of countdown (07/08/01) Shuttle countdown begins; weather forecast uncertain (07/09/01) Shuttle countdown on track; weather remains a concern (07/11/01) Atlantis rockets into orbit (07/12/01) Atlantis docks with space station (07/13/01) Airlock installed on space station (07/14-15/01) Airlock activation begins; mission extended (07/16-17/01) 3 gas tanks installed during second spacewalk (07/17-18/01) Third spacewalk to install final gas tank (07/20-21/01) Third spacewalk staged from station's new airlock (07/21/01) Shuttle undocks from space station (07/22/01) Shuttle landing delayed by weather (07/23-24/01) Shuttle Atlantis returns to Earth (07/24-25/01) =================================================================== Shuttle crew participates in dress rehearsal countdown (06/29/01) The crew of the shuttle Atlantis strapped in for a dress-rehearsal countdown today at pad 39B, setting the stage for launch July 12 on the next space station assembly mission. The goal of the 105th shuttle flight is to deliver the space station's main airlock, enabling on-board crews to stage maintenance and repair spacewalks between shuttle visits. Space station assembly flight 7A originally was planned for earlier this month, but the mission was put on hold pending resolution of subtle problems affecting the station's Canadian-built robot arm. Those problems have now been resolved and Atlantis has been cleared for flight. The latest flight plan is posted below, along with useful links to crew bios and updated shuttle program statistics. =================================================================== Astronauts arrive for start of countdown (07/08/01) The crew of the shuttle Atlantis flew to the Kennedy Space Center Sunday evening for the 8 a.m. Monday start of the countdown to blastoff Thursday on a tricky mission to install the international space station's main U.S. airlock module. Flying sleek T-38 jet trainers, the astronauts touched down on the space center's 3-mile-long shuttle runway a few minutes past 10 p.m., about a half-hour late because of minor problems during a refueling stop. "It's great to be here," said commander Steven Lindsey. "We really appreciate all the hard work that both the shuttle program has put into the vehicle and the space station program has put into getting the station ready for us to go and install the airlock here in a couple of days. We really appreciate the folks here at KSC working our vehicle real hard to get us all ready. So we're looking forward to an on-time launch Thursday morning." Lindsey and his crewmates - pilot Charles Hobaugh, flight engineer Janet Kavandi and spacewalkers Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly - are scheduled to blast off at 5:04 a.m. Thursday. As Lindsey said, the goal of the 105th shuttle mission is to deliver the international space station's U.S. airlock module. Once in place, the airlock will enable station crews to stage repair and maintenance spacewalks between shuttle missions. Atlantis' launch originally was targeted for mid June, but the flight was delayed pending resolution of subtle problems with the space station's new Canadian-built robot arm. The airlock cannot be installed without the new Canadarm2, but engineers are now confident the high-tech space crane is healthy and ready for action. =================================================================== Shuttle countdown begins; weather forecast uncertain (07/09/01) The shuttle Atlantis' countdown to blastoff on a critical space station assembly mission got underway today at 8 a.m., setting the stage for launch at 5:04 a.m. Thursday. There are no technical problems at pad 39B, but forecasters are calling for a 30 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms Wednesday evening that would delay fueling and a 40 percent chance of storms that would delay launch Thursday. The odds worsen to 60 percent "no-go" Friday and Saturday. =================================================================== Shuttle countdown on track; weather remains a concern (07/11/01) Keeping an eye on threatening weather, engineers rolled a protective gantry away from the shuttle Atlantis today and readied the spacecraft for fueling tonight and launch early Thursday on a flight to deliver a critical airlock module to the international space station. There are no technical problems at pad 39B and launch remains targeted for 5:03:59 a.m. The launch window closes five minutes later at 5:08:59 a.m. But forecasters are predicting a 30 percent chance of thunderstorms that could delay fueling this evening and a 40 percent chance of rain showers and clouds that would prevent a launching Thursday during Atlantis' five-minute window. NASA managers plan to meet at 7 p.m. to assess the weather and to determine whether engineers can proceed with fueling. NASA flight rules forbid the start of fueling operations if lightning is observed within five nautical miles of the launch pad or if forercasters predict a 20 percent chance of lightning within five miles during the first hour of fueling. The three-hour fueling procedure is scheduled to begin around 7:30 p.m. The shuttle countdown has enough "hold" time built in to accommodate a fueling delay of up to about two hours, but if propellants aren't flowing by 10 p.m. or so, launch will be delayed to Friday. The outlook for Friday and Saturday is slightly worse, with forecasters predicting a 60 percent chance of launch delays both days. The shuttle must be off the ground by July 18 or the flight will be delayed to around Sept. 27, after an August mission and work to upgrade Air Force tracking systems. NASA television coverage of Thursday's launch attempt will begin at midnight. Here's a timeline of major milestones between then and liftoff: TIME..........EVENT 11:08 p.m.....Begin a two-hour hold at T-3 hours 07/12/01 12:00 a.m.....NASA television coverage begins 12:05 a.m.....Replay of crew breakfast/photo op on NASA television 12:35 a.m.....Crew gets a final weather briefing 01:08 a.m.....Terminal countdown begins 01:13 a.m.....Astronauts depart crew quarters 01:43 a.m.....The crew straps in for launch 03:48 a.m.....Begin a 10-minute hold at T-20 minutes 03:58 a.m.....Resume countdown 04:09 a.m.....Begin a 46-minute hold at T-9 minutes 04:55 a.m.....Resume countdown 04:59 a.m.....Launch window opens 05:04 a.m.....Liftoff 05:09 a.m.....Launch window closes 05:13 a.m.....Atlantis reaches preliminary orbit Assuming an on-time liftoff, Atlantis will dock with the international space station around 10:50 p.m. Friday. The first of three spacewalks to install and activate the station's new airlock module is scheduled to begin around 10:10 p.m. Saturday. The remaining two excursions will begin late in the evening next Tuesday and Thursday. If all goes well, Atlantis will undock from the space station just after midnight July 21 and land back at the Kennedy Space Center around 1 a.m. July 23. A detailed flight plan and the latest NASA television schedule are posted below. As with all space station missions, Atlantis' actual launch window opens five minutes before Earth's rotation carries the pad into the plane of the station's orbit and closes five minutes later. For Thursday's attempt, the window will open at 4:59:00 a.m. and close at 5:08:59 a.m. The "in-plane" time, as mentioned above, is 5:03:59 a.m. For a Friday launching, the window will open at 4:36:25 a.m. and close at 4:46:24 a.m. The in-plane launch time Friday will be 4:41:24 a.m. =================================================================== Atlantis rockets into orbit (07/12/01) 01:45 a.m., 7/12/01, Update: Astronauts strap in for launch Buoyed by improving weather, the Atlantis astronauts began strapping in at launch pad 39B shortly before 2 a.m. with all systems "go" for liftoff at 5:03:59 a.m. There are no technical problems with the shuttle or its ground systems and forecasters are no longer worried about rain or thundershowers that would delay launch. But they are keeping close tabs on the possible development of a low deck of clouds that could cause problems. Because of the possibility of an engine failure or other problem that could force a crew to attempt an emergency return to the Kennedy Space Center, shuttle flight rules forbid a launch if the sky is overcast below 8,000 feet. Forecasters say a broken deck as low as 2,000 feet could develop as the morning wears on, but as of 1:30 a.m., the sky was clear, with Mars shining in the west and a half moon rising in the east. All in all, a beautiful morning. The goal of the 105th shuttle mission is to deliver a $164 million airlock module to the international space station that will enable on-board crews to stage repair and maintenance spacewalks between shuttle visits. Today's launch window opens at 4:59:00 a.m. and closes at 5:08:59 a.m. The preferred "in-plane" time, the moment when Earth's rotation carries the launch pad into the plane of the space station's orbit, is 5:03:59 a.m. This time may change by a few seconds based on final radar updates of the station's orbit. Here's a timeline of today's activities: TIME..........EVENT 01:43 a.m.....The crew straps in for launch 03:48 a.m.....Begin a 10-minute hold at T-20 minutes 03:58 a.m.....Resume countdown 04:09 a.m.....Begin a 46-minute hold at T-9 minutes 04:55 a.m.....Resume countdown 04:59 a.m.....Launch window opens 05:04 a.m.....Liftoff 05:09 a.m.....Launch window closes 05:13 a.m.....Atlantis reaches preliminary orbit (137 sm by 36 sm) 05:16 a.m.....Launch replays on NASA television 05:42 a.m.....OMS-2 orbit circularization rocket firing (143 X 121) 06:00 a.m.....Post-launch news conference on NASA television 06:29 a.m.....Payload bay door opening 07:34 a.m.....On-board computer network setup 08:41 a.m.....NC-1 rendezvous rocket firing 09:04 a.m.....On-board computer powerdown to conserve electricity 10:00 a.m.....Flight day highlights reel on NASA television 10:04 a.m.....Crew sleep begins 06:04 p.m.....Crew wakeup A detailed status report/mission overview will be filed after Atlantis takes off. 05:45 a.m., 7/12/01, Update: Shuttle Atlantis streaks into orbit The shuttle Atlantis shot off after the international space station today, carrying a $164 million airlock module that will permit station crews to stage critical repair and maintenance spacewalks when the shuttle isn't there. With sunrise still an hour and a half away, Atlantis thundered away from the Kennedy Space Center on time at 5:03:59 a.m., the instant Earth's rotation carried launch pad 39B into the plane of the space station's orbit. With its three hydrogen-fueled main engines roaring at full throttle, Atlantis climbed skyward atop 600-foot tongues of 5,000-degree flame from its twin solid-fuel boosters, briefly turning night into day in a spectacular light show visible for hundreds of miles around. Eight-and-a-half minutes later, after rocketing up the East Coast of the United States, the spaceplane slipped into its planned preliminary orbit, hot on the trail of the international space station. If all goes well, commander Steven Lindsey will guide Atlantis to a docking with the orbital outpost around 10:50 p.m. Friday. Atlantis' launching marked the debut flight of an upgraded "block 2" main engine, the first of a new breed equipped with weld-free high pressure hydrogen turbopumps built by Pratt & Whitney instead of Boeing's Rocketdyne division, the builder of the main engines. Only one such block 2 engine was installed aboard Atlantis for this first flight and while detailed performance data are not yet available, it appeared to work normally. All of NASA's shuttle engines eventually will be equipped with the new pumps, completing a $1 billion post-Challenger upgrade intended to make the powerplants more reliable and less susceptible to failures. "The turbopump we currently fly works just fine, but it's got several welds in it, lots of welds, very difficult to inspect and maintain," Lindsey said before launch. "This new turbopump is designed, it's cast with no welds whatsoever. It's a very, very robust easy to inspect, more reliable turbopump." With the older block 2A engines - those without the Pratt & Whitney hydrogen pump - the odds of a catastrophic shuttle failure during launch were 1-in-438. The block 2 engines improve the odds to 1-in-483. But those number include possible booster failures and other catastrophic malfunctions. For the main engines alone, the odds of a catastrophic failure are 1-in-999 for the block 2A engines and 1-in-1,283 for the block 2 powerplants. Joining Lindsey aboard Atlantis are rookie pilot Charles Hobaugh, flight engineer Janet Kavandi and spacewalkers Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly. Launch originally was scheduled for mid June, but the flight was put on hold after the station's three-person crew - Yuri Usachev, Susan Helms and James Voss - ran into subtle problems with the station's new Canadian-built robot arm. The new arm is required to install the airlock because the shuttle's robot arm isn't long enough. The Canadarm2 is equipped with fully redundant computers, electronics and drive mechanisms, known collectively as "strings." The primary string performed normally during tests and check out in May, but the redundant string suffered three baffling failures. Engineers ultimately determined the arm was working fine. The most vexing problem with the redundant string - a failure of the arm's shoulder pitch joint - apparently resulted when a specific circuit suffered intermittent communications glitches during self-test operations. Software patches were written to mask out negative self-test results, preventing the arm's master control software from "safing" the arm after any future self-test failures. Flight directors are confident the arm will work properly during Atlantis' mission. Taking no chances, however, the arm maneuvers required to install the airlock were modified to simplify the procedure. And if worse comes to worse, Gernhardt and Reilly have trained to manually drive the arm's joints with power wrenches should both strings fail. Airlock installation is planned for overnight Saturday during the first of three spacewalks by Gernhardt and Reilly. To make sure both crews are prepared for the critical installation procedure, a dry run is scheduled overnight Friday. The first item on the agenda after docking, in fact, is a joint crew meeting to review earlier training and changes made since then to ensure everyone understands the choreography required and how contingency procedures will be implemented if necessary. "We want to actually get the two crews together who haven't actually been in the same room for several months now and let them talk about the next day's activities, to make sure they're all on the same page with the choreography of using both arms in the spacewalk and make sure they just generally have a good level of confidence and they're all ready to go the next day," said flight director Paul Hill. "Once we've done that, Susan's going to take the station arm out and go through more or less a rehearsal or a dry run of the full airlock unberthing and installation procedure using all the shuttle cameras, the vision system, pretty much the way we expect to do it the next day. It's sort of a final shakedown and confidence run." The airlock is a marvel of high-tech design and innovation. It will be attached to the starboard, or right-side hatch, of the Unity connecting node positioned between the U.S. laboratory module, Destiny, and the Russian Zarya propulsion module. The airlock has two sections: An outer crew lock, the small volume that is actually depressurized and opened to space during a spacewalk, and a larger equipment lock that butts up against Unity's starboard hatch. "The crew lock is the smaller section, and that's where the two spacewalking astronauts actually go inside, close the hatch and depressurize down to vacuum, and then open up another hatch and do their spacewalk," Lindsey said in a NASA interview. "On the other side of that crew lock is something called the equipment lock and the equipment lock houses the ... meat of the airlock, all of the systems." Those systems include computers, spacesuit battery chargers, systems to replenish spacesuit cooling water, an atmospheric control system that scrubs carbon dioxide from the air while providing pressurized oxygen and nitrogen for spacesuit tanks. "One thing that's very unique about the airlock as opposed to how we do spacewalks today is that the airlock actually has a depressurization pump," Lindsey explained. "In the shuttle, when you vent the airlock out so the astronauts can go down to vacuum, you actually vent all that gas out to space and you lose the nitrogen and oxygen, so you have to replenish it from inside." The new airlock features a system "that will actually pump this atmosphere back into the space station, pump it down, and then we open up the hatches, and, when they come back in, we open the valves and it repressurizes. The advantage of that is it doesn't use very much gas so we don't have to continually replenish gas whenever you [do] a spacewalk." After installation of the airlock overnight Saturday, the joint shuttle-station crews will spend two days working to "more or less wake the airlock up and turn it into an active piece of the space station," said Hill. Overnight Tuesday, Gernhardt and Reilly will stage a second spacewalk to mount two large tanks of pressurized oxygen and nitrogen on the airlock's hull. The tanks will be used to repressurize the airlock after spacewalks, saving air that otherwise would be dumped overboard during the depressurization process. The new airlock will be put to the test overnight Thursday when Gernhardt and Reilly use it for the first time for a third and final spacewalk to install two more oxygen and nitrogen tanks. "We have high confidence we can get the airlock installed and we can get all the tanks installed," said Hill. "But we have gone a long ways to make sure that if we see worst-case failures with the arm we can keep right on running and still deliver a station EVA (spacewalk) capability." If all goes well, Atlantis will undock from the space station late next Saturday evening and return to Earth two days later, around 1 a.m. on Monday, July 23. As of today, Usachev, Helms and Voss have been in orbit for 126 days. They are scheduled to be replaced by a fresh crew during a shuttle mission now set for launch Aug. 9. =================================================================== Atlantis docks with space station (07/13/01) The shuttle Atlantis glided to a gentle docking with the international space station late Friday as the two spacecraft sailed over equator east of Brazil in orbital darkness. Taking his time, commander Steven Lindsey guilded Atlantis to a glacial, deliberate linkup at 11:08 p.m., 15 minutes behind schedule. "Docking confirmed," said NASA commentator Rob Navias in mission control. "Both vehicles in free drift." After leak checks to verify the integrity of seals between the two spacecraft, Lindsey and his crewmates - pilot Charles Hobaugh, flight engineer Janet Kavandi and spacewalkers Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly - planned to open hatches and and float into the station to join Expedition Two commander Yuri Usachev, Susan Helms and James Voss. =================================================================== Airlock installed on space station (07/14-15/01) 11:20 p.m., 07/14/01, Update: Airlock installation spacewalk begins Floating in the shuttle Atlantis' airlock, astronauts Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly switched their spacesuits to internal power at 11:10 p.m. to officially begin the first of three planned spacewalks to install and activate a new $164 million airlock module on the international space station. This evening's spacewalk is expected to last about seven hours. For the statistically minded, this is the 106th spacewalk by astronauts on U.S. space missions, the 65th in shuttle program history and the 22nd dedicated to space station assembly. In the 21 previous station spacewalks, 22 astronauts and two Russian cosmonauts logged 139 hours and nine minutes putting the outpost together. The primary goal of the 105th shuttle mission is to install a new airlock on the space station. Once the airlock is in place, station crews will be able to routinely stage repair and maintenance spacewalks when shuttle crew aren't present. Spacewalks are possible now, but only using Russian spacesuits. The airlock will be attached to the starboard port of the six-hatch Unity connecting module. To get a feel for this location, here's a quick review of the station's current configuration. At the front end of the station, as it flies along in its orbit, is the U.S. laboratory module, Destiny. Destiny, in turn is attached to one of the Unity's module's two end hatches. Attached to the other end hatch is a pressurized tunnel called a mating adapter that connects Unity to the Russian Zarya module. At the far end of Zarya is the Zvezda command and control module and attached to Zvezda's aft port, making up what amounts to the caboose if the station was a train, is a Russian Progress supply ship. A Russian Soyuz crew lifeboat is docked to a downward-facing, or nadir, port on the Zarya module. The Unity module has two end hatches and four other hatches around its circumference. On the zenith, or upward-facing hatch, is a structural truss that carries the huge P6 solar arrays. On the left-side hatch is another pressurized mating adapter. The 6.5-ton, 18.5-foot-long airlock will be attached to the right-side hatch. Atlantis is docked to a pressurized mating adapter on the front end of the Destiny module and the shuttle's robot arm is not long enough to move the airlock from the ship's cargo bay up to Unity's starboard hatch. Instead, space station astronaut Susan Helms will do the heavy lifting using the station's own robot arm, installed during the most recent shuttle visit last April. Before Helms lifts the airlock from Atlantis' cargo bay, Reilly will climb on the shuttle's robot arm, operated by astronaut Janet Kavandi, and install fixtures on the airlock's hull that will be used during a second and third spacewalk to attach high-pressure oxygen and nitrogen tanks. Gernhardt, meanwhile, will remove a 12-foot-wide thermal cover protecting the airlock's common berthing mechanism. While Reilly stows the thermal cover and a set of seal covers, Gernhardt will unplug a power cable providing electricity to the airlock's heaters. Water lines run throughout the airlock and the heaters have been used since launch to keep them from freezing. Another power line will be plugged in after the airlock is attached to the station. At that point, Helms will be ready to unberth the airlock. At the same time, Gernhardt and Reilly will take turns retreating to Atlantis' airlock to top off their oxygen supplies. Helms, working at a computer work station inside the Destiny module, will lift the airlock from its berth and move it to within a few feet of the Unity module's starboard hatch. Gernhardt and Reilly then will make their way to Unity to inspect the docking mechanism before it is engaged. During a spacewalk in April, an electrical connecter came apart when an antenna was removed from that hatch and flight controllers want to make sure no debris is lurking in the docking mechanism that could prevent a good mating. Helms then will drive the airlock into position for latching and 18 motorized bolts will drive home to lock the module in place. At that point, Gernhardt will plug in another electrical cable to re-power the airlock's heater system. Atlantis originally was scheduled for launch in mid June, but the flight was put on hold when problems were encountered during tests and checkout of the Canadarm2 space crane in May. Engineers ultimately traced the problem to an intermittent glitch with a diagnostic circuit in the arm's backup shoulder pitch joint mechanism. Software patches were developed to mask out the problem should it occur again. Just in case, engineers developed a detailed set of contingency procedures to make sure the astronauts can install the airlock even if arm problems develop. If worse comes to worse, Gernhardt and Reilly can use power tools to manually reposition the robot arm's joints as required to get the airlock into position for mating or, at the very least, close enough to re-attach a power cable to drive the airlock's heaters. "We've done a lot of work to make sure the shuttle arm can reach all the station joints necessary to drive the arm if for some reason the arm had multiple failures and was stuck right over the payload bay," said flight director Paul Hill. "So we could move the airlock all the way up to the node and we can connect up that power connector, which would then keep the airlock alive. So we've changed the trajectory to make it simple for us to do that and to make sure we have the reach necessary with the shuttle arm." This evening's spacewalk is scheduled to last about seven hours. Overnight Tuesday, Gernhardt and Reilly will stage a second excursion to install a high-pressure oxygen tank and high pressure tank of nitrogen on the airlock. Another set of tanks will be installed during a third spacewalk overnight Thursday. For that spacewalk, Gernhardt and Reilly will use the space station's new airlock for the first time. 12:50 a.m., 7/15/01, Update: Station arm grapples airlock Space station astronaut Susan Helms, operating the lab's Canadarm2 space crane, grappled the Quest airlock module at 12:49 a.m., setting the stage for a delicate series of arm maneuvers to unberth the module from the shuttle Atlantis' payload bay. "Houston, Alpha. We see a good grapple on the airlock," station astronaut James Voss radioed after the arm locked onto the module's grapple fixture. Airlock grapple came one hour and 39 minutes into a planned seven-hour spacewalk by astronauts Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly to install the airlock on the station's Unity module. The spacewalk began about an hour behind schedule, but the astronauts were able to make up ground in the early going and by the time of grapple, they were close to being back on their original timeline. 01:10 a.m., 7/15/01, Update: Airlock unberthed At 1:10 a.m., astronaut Susan Helms began unberthing the Quest airlock module from the shuttle Atlantis' cargo bay. 04:00 a.m., 7/15/01, Update: Airlock installed on space station The $164 million Quest airlock module was successfully attached to the international space station around 3:45 a.m. today. Astronaut Susan Helms had no problems using the space station's Canadarm2 space crane to move the airlock from the shuttle Atlantis' cargo bay to its mounting point on the right hatch of the Unity module. "We're really pleased to have the airlock mated to the station, essentially completing phase two of the assembly of the international space station," said station astronaut James Voss. "Susan did a wonderul job of flying the arm today and geting the airlock on board." Space walkers Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly were standing by to provide verbal alignment cues if necessary, but Helms, who took her time and flew a slow-but-sure trajectory with the robot arm, had no problems. Gernhardt then hooked up a power cable to provide electricity to the airlock's heaters. 05:15 a.m., 7/15/01, Update: Successful spacewalk ends Astronauts Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly began repressurizing the shuttle Atlantis' airlock at 5:09 a.m., officially ending a successul five-hour and 59-minute spacewalk to attach a 6.5-ton airlock module to the side of the international space station. There were no problems of any significance and the spacewalk, which began an hour later than planned, ended ahead of schedule. "I think we can call it a total victory," said shuttle pilot Charles Hobaugh. "We did well." It was the 106th spacewalk by astronauts on U.S. space missions, the 65th in shuttle program history and the 22nd dedicated to space station assembly. In the 22 station spacewalks to date, 24 astronauts and two Russian cosmonauts logged 145 hours and eight minutes putting the orbital outpost together. 06:35 a.m., 7/15/01, Update: Kudos all 'round for airlock installation With a new airlock now bolted to the side of the international space station, flight controllers took time out to praise station flier Susan Helms, who deftly used the lab's new Canadian robot arm to install the 6.5-ton module. "I just wanted to say absolutely fantastic job today," station flight director Mark Kirasich radioed Helms from mission control. "It was quite a treat sitting down here watching you." "Thanks, Mark. Of course I didn't do it alone," Helms replied. "First of all, I had my trusty sidekick Jim (Voss) with me and Yuri (Usachev), of course, was keeping things under control while we were doing this. But we obviouysly didn't do this without thousands of people on the ground helping us and if it hadn't been for you guys and the plan you put together, we never would have gotten where we got today in such a timely way. ... So thanks, Mark. And pass on my thanks to the whole team. We know what you're doing tonight!" "Yes, well thank you, Susan. It was great to watch. Excellent job." "Those Canadians really know how to build great hardware, I'll tell you," Helms said of the Canadarm2 space crane. At a post spacewalk news briefing, shuttle flight director Paul Hill said simply, "Well, we made history today." "The international space station reached into the Atlantis' payload bay using its own arm and pulled a cargo element out and installed it," he said. "And voila, the station now has a brand new module. The EVA started about an hour late, but we made that time up through the course of the EVA and ended 10 minutes early. And that's after we added three additional tasks that weren't originally planned for the day. The station arm performed flawlessly. "We're all set now for airlock outfitting and checkout over the course of the next couple of days," he said. "We'll end the day tomorrow with an active module. We'll have the oxygen and nitrogen systems pressurized from the orbiter and the next day, we'll do the final outfitting in the airlock." Hill also took a moment to praise Helms. "She did a super job," he said. "We were not able to train her at the same levels we normally train an arm operator very close to flight and she did a super job. The airlock and the SSRMS (station robot arm) pretty much were right on rails all the way to the install position." =================================================================== Airlock activation begins (07/16-17/01) 07:20 a.m., 7/16/01, Update: Astronauts begin airlock activation The space station astronauts ran into the first hiccup of the shuttle Atlantis' airlock installation mission today, falling behind schedule slightly as they scrambled to overcome a minor but time-consuming coolant system glitch. Air trapped in the airlock's water coolant lines apparently caused about a half-quart of water to leak out during work to connect the lines to a manifold in the station's Unity module. The water was quickly sopped up, but when subsequent connections were made between Unity and the Destiny laboratory module, the station's main computer detected a pressure drop it interpreted as a leak. The computer then dutifully shut down the lab's cooling system, setting off a quick scramble to figure out what had happened. "We anticipated some amount of air in those lines and we had all kinds of calculations to tell us exactly how much air there would be, whether or not the gas traps in the system were capable of taking that air out without hurting the pumps, etc.," said lead flight director Paul Hill. "What we hadn't accounted for was the software response detecting that pressure drop and shutting the system down because it thought it had a leak. That surprised us." Ground controllers ultimately resolved the problem and reactivated the cooling system. The astronauts then powered up the airlock's main computer and tested its internal communications circuits. They originally planned to pressurize and purge the module's oxygen and nitrogen lines, but because of time lost troubleshooting the coolant system problem they delayed the oxygen purge one day. Flight controllers said that would have no impact on the airlock's checkout. Astronaut Susan Helms, meanwhile, spent the morning troubleshooting a glitch with the space station's central computer network server. She fixed that problem by replacing a faulty circuit card. 02:45 a.m., 7/17/01, Update: Astronauts continue valve troubleshooting The Alpha astronauts are continuing work this morning to fix a leaking valve between the Unity connecting node and the new Quest airlock module. So far, troubleshooting efforts have not been successful. Astronauts James Voss and station commander Yury Usachev say the valve appears to be rotating a bit past the closed position, opening slightly and causing a leak, possibly because of a loose set screw. The valve port has been capped off to prevent any additional leakage while engineers at the Johnson Space Center in Houston assess the issue to determine a workaround. Earlier this morning, shuttle Atlantis commander Steven Lindsey downplayed the valve glitch, telling CBS News "it's a small snag but we'll figure it out." "We're looking at that right now," he said. "We've been doing some leak check procedures today, running through a number of maintenance steps with the ground trying to figure out exactly what's going on with it. We're going to probably take it out and maybe replace it." The $164 million airlock module was installed early Sunday during the first of three planned spacewalks by shuttle astronauts Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly. A second EVA is planned tonight to attach high-pressure oxygen and nitrogen tanks to the new module. Two more such tanks will be installed during a third spacewalk overnight Thursday. The astronauts plan to stage the final spacewalk from the new airlock module. But shuttle pilot Charles Hobaugh said if the leaking valve cannot be fixed in time - and engineers are confident it will be repaired shortly - Gernhardt and Reilly could proceed using the shuttle's airlock. "We have contingency capability to be able to do that third EVA out of the shuttle airlock if need be," Hobaugh said. "We've been trying real hard to make sure we get the ISS airlock installed and set up after this next EVA so that we can make sure all the systems work. So we're really hot on trying to get the ISS airlock set so we can do it. But if we can't get it ready in time, we can always go out the shuttle so it's really no problem." With the valve capped off, Gernhardt and Reilly are gearing up to stage a dress rehearsal of spacewalk preparations using the new Quest airlock. The dry run includes a new technique for purging nitrogen from the bloodstreams of the spacewalkers, a necessary step before any excursion using low-pressure 5-psi spacesuits. Without purging nitrogen, spacewalkers could get the bends, or decompression sickness. For shuttle spacewalks, the orbiter's cabin air pressure is lowered from 14.7 psi to 10.2 psi the day before an EVA. Then, on the day of the outing, the spacewalkers breathe pure oxygen before exiting to complete the process. Lowering the space station's air pressure to 10.2 psi isn't an options because of the volume involved. As a result, NASA developed a new pre-breathe procedure that will dramatically reduce the amount of time station spacewalkers need to spend on the nitrogen purging process. Wearing oxygen masks, spacewalkers will exercise for 10 minutes each and then return to the airlock. After closing the main hatch to the station, the airlock's pressure will be lowered to 10.2 psi. Once in their spacesuits, the astronauts will resume breathing pure oxygen and do a bit of additional exercise. The entire procedure takes just two hours and 20 minutes or so. "A key element of this new protocol is exercise," said station flight director Mark Kirasich. "The scientific studies have shown that if you exercise and you increase the blood flow through your system, you can get the nitrogen out of your system quicker. So this is an exercise protocol." As an alternative, station spacewalkers also could simply camp out in the airlock the night before an outing, lowering the compartment's pressure to 10.2 psi just like in the shuttle. But research shows the new exercise protocol is more effective at removing nitrogen. 05:15 a.m., 7/17/01, Update: NASA managers mull mission extension; valve problem considered a 'nuisance' Trouble with a leaky valve in the space station's air circulation system will not prevent two astronauts from staging a spacewalk from the station's new $164 million airlock overnight Thursday. But lead flight director Paul Hill said troubleshooting efforts and earlier minor-but-time-consuming snags have used up valuable time and mission managers are considering a one-day mission extension to give the astronauts more time to complete airlock tests and checkout. The shuttle has enough on-board supplies to remain in space at least two additional days while still preserving two days for bad weather that could delay landing. "Since we still have at least two additional days above what we'd planned for this mission, we are already considering adding a day to the mission to relax the pace fo the crew, to finish up (airlock) outfitting and to allow us to get through any last troubleshooting before we declare the airlock ready and send a crew out of it for the first time," Hill said. "But that decision hasn't been made yet. ... By the end of the day tomorrow, we'll be far enough along that we'll make a positive decision one way or the other." The 6.5-ton airlock was attached to the space station early Sunday during the first of three planned spacewalks by Atlantis astronauts Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly. During outfitting Monday, the crew ran into a minor problem when trapped air in the airlock's water coolant lines forced about a half quart of water to leak out into the station. That was no problem in and of itself - some amount of trapped air was expected and the water was easily sopped up - but flight controllers were surprised when the station's central computer system, believing there was a leak, shut the cooling system down. Engineers corrected that problem after a bit of head scratching and the airlock's coolant system is now working normally. Later, however, another problem cropped up, this one involving a leaking air circulation valve. Each U.S. station module is equipped with two such motor-driven, computer-controlled valves that cycle open and closed as required to keep fresh air moving throughout the space station. One of the two valves between the Unity module and the new airlock was found to be leaking slightly during a pressure test Monday, allowing air from the space station to leak into the airlock. The airlock must be able to operate at 10.2 psi for spacewalk preparations and if air is leaking into the module from the rest of the station, that might not be possible. The valves are needed to quickly repressurize the airlock in an emergency. With both valves operational, the airlock can be fully repressurized in six seconds. With just one valve, it takes 12 seconds. After troubleshooting efforts early today, the crew simply capped the valve and sealed the line. The airlock later was taken down to 10.2 psi for a spacewalk dress rehearsal and the cap held pressure as required. Hill said Gernhardt and Reilly will be able to stage the airlock's first spacewalk as planned, regardless of the leaking valve. The only question is when it will be carried out: Overnight Thursday or, if the flight is extended a day, on Friday. "Today 's problem was another one of those small details that can have a big effect in spaceflight," he said. "One of two intermodule ventilation valves that goes through the bulkhead of the node into the airlock was leaking. And we tried a couple of relatively simple things to try to fix that valve and stop the leak and neither of those was successful. We have since capped that valve, did another leak check and we were able to successfully stop the leak. So we did confirm, at least, that it was that aft valve on the starboard bulkhead that was leaking." Spare valves are available, but replacement would take about two full hours. The crew already is about a half-day behind schedule and Hill said a valve replacement probably would not be scheduled during Atlantis' mission just because of the already tight schedule. "The combination of the water loop and this IMV valve problem has put us about a half a day behind," Hill said. "There are a few additional airlock equipment checkouts that we slid off of today's timeline. The hatch relocation that we were supposed to do to get us set up for the EVA, we also have delayed. We're wrapping all of those things up and we're going to see if they will fit on flight day eight and still allow us to be ready for EVA-3 out of the joint airlock on time on flight day nine." "As problems go that we have to deal with, these are relatively small," he said. "The airlock overall is up and active and looks fine. I think we'll get through these problems and we'll still be set up to do an EVA from this airlock on this flight." 09:45 a.m., 7/17/01, Update: Shuttle mission extended one day NASA's mission management team met this morning and agreed to extend the shuttle Atlantis' mission by one day to give the astronauts more time to complete activation and checkout of the international space station's $164 million airlock module (see the 5:15 a.m. entry below for details). As a result, the shuttle crew's third and final spacewalk, using the new airlock for the first time, will slip one day from overnight Thursday to late Friday and into Saturday morning. Landing is now targeted for around 2 a.m. EDT on Tuesday, July 24. A revised mission timeline and television schedule will be posted as soon as NASA makes them available. =================================================================== 3 gas tanks installed during second spacewalk (07/17-18/01) 09:15 p.m., 07/17/01, Update: Station computer reset; spacewalk stays on track A hung-up hard drive needed by one of the international space station's three primary command-and-control computers was successfully restarted this evening, clearing the way for use of the station's Canadarm2 spacecrane during a spacewalk by shuttle astronauts Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly. Hard drive failures were blamed for a series of computer malfunctions in late April that sidelined all three of the station's critical command-and-control computers. Those failures were blamed on hardware problems while the glitch today apparently was caused by a software hang up that was fixed by issuing a reset command. What caused the software to hang up in the first place is under study. The three C&C computers control all aspects of space station operation. One computer typically is designated prime, a second is configured as a backup and the third is kept in standby mode, ready to step in if needed. C&C No. 3 was acting as the primary computer this afternoon when its hard drive malfunctioned, throwing a wrench into spacewalk preparations. The hard drive was loaded with software needed to operate the station's robot arm. C&C No. 1 also was loaded with robot arm software but engineers did not want to begin a spacewalk with critical robot arm operations without full redundancy. The objective of the spacewalk is to install two of four high-pressure air tanks on the station's new $164 million airlock module. The other two tank are scheduled for intallation during a third spacewalk overnight Friday. Two of the tanks - the ones scheduled for installation Friday - can be maneuvered into position with the shuttle's robot arm. But the two on tap for installation this evening must be installed by the station's arm. With recovery of the C&C No. 1 hard drive, flight controllers have elected to press ahead with the original plan and to use the station's robot arm to install the air tanks that cannot be put in place by the shuttle's arm. The spacewalk is scheduled to begin arond 10:09 p.m. 11:05 p.m., 07/17/01, Update: Second spacewalk begins Floating in the shuttle Atlantis' airlock, astronauts Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly switched their spacesuits to internal battery power at 11:04 p.m. to officially begin a tricky spacewalk to manhandle two 1,200-pound air tanks into place on the international space station's new airlock. The air tanks - one for oxygen, one for nitrogen - will be plucked from the shuttle's cargo bay by station astronaut Susan Helms, operating the lab's Canadarm2 space crane. Once each tank is positioned over its mounting point near the airlock, she will hand them off to Gernhardt and Reilly, who will manually maneuver them into place using guide posts. While the tanks weigh a half-ton each, visibility, not mass, is the major concern for the spacewalkers. Because of the locations of foot restraints on the airlock's hull, "neither Jim nor I can see all four corners of the tank," Gernhardt said before launch. "We solved this problem by using an old trick from the sub-sea business of using a guidepost. Jim will actually install this guidepost and above it on the tank is a thing called a bell guide. Susan Helms, the robot arm operator, will bring the tank very close, about eight to 12 inches off this guidepost. Jim is looking straight down, boresight, at this guide post and we expect to take the tank and just very lightly walk it over the guidepost, which will then take out the rotational degrees of freedom. We expect that will actually make this quite a simple task." This is the 107th spacewalk by astronauts on a U.S. space mission, the 66th in the history of the shuttle program and the 23rd devoted to space station assembly. Going into this evening's EVA, 24 U.S. astronauts and two Russian cosmonauts had logged 145 hours and eight minutes in station assembly spacewalks. 01:00 a.m., 7/18/01, Update: Oxygen tank installed on airlock; but no air flows Spacewalkers Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly successfully maneuvered a 1,200-pound high-pressure oxygen tank into place on the international space station's new airlock this morning. But initial attempts to tie the tank into the airlock's oxygen lines did not appear to work. When the tank's main isolation valve was opened, engineers monitoring telemetry at the Johnson Space Center said they could not detect any change in pressure. After a bit of troubleshooting, the spacewalkers were told to press ahead with work to install a high-pressure nitrogen tank while engineers assessed the issue with the oxygen tank. The first tank's installation went smoothly, just as the astronauts had practiced. First, station flier Susan Helms, operating the lab's Canadarm2 space crane, moved the tank from the shuttle Atlantis' cargo bay to a point just a few inches above its mounting point on the airlock's hull. Gernhardt and Reilly, their feet anchored in restraints, then took the tank from Helms and manually latched it down on the airlock. "OK, the tank is stable," Gernhardt said as Helms released it. A moment later, James Voss warned, "We are backing off now." "Roger that," Reilly said. "OK, I see the pin is clear," Gernhardt said. "All right, J.R., are you ready to come down slow?" "Ready, let's go." "OK, comning down nice and slow... I'm two inches off soft dock..." "Yeah, Mike, I'm over the guide post," Reilly confirmed. "OK, I'm an inch off soft dock." "We're going to back the SSRMS out," Voss said. "I see soft dock on the starboard gang latch but not the port... now we're on the port..." Gernhardt advised. "Do you see the single latch, Jim?" Hobaugh asked. "Yes it is, it's soft docked.: "I'm going to go to hard dock... and I am hard docked," Gernhardt said, "the pin is in and you are clear, Jim." "Thanks, buddy." "Yeah, nice flying on the arm," Gernhardt replied. "I would say we had a very, very small amount of separation force there, very low, some movement, but quite acceptable." "Beautiful job, guys, that looked great," Hobaugh said. 07:00 a.m., 7/18/01, Update: NASA managers pleased with successful spacewalk Two spacewalking astronauts successfully attached three high-pressure air tanks to the international space station's new airlock today after a brief computer scare reminiscent of glitches in April that crippled the orbital outpost. Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly originally intended to install just two tanks, one loaded with 3,000-pound-per-square-inch oxygen and one with nitrogen. But the work went so smoothly they went ahead and installed a second oxygen tank that was to have been attached during a spacewalk this weekend. "Good work, good support by the whole team today," space station astronaut James Voss radioed flight controllers when the excursion concluded. "A lot of work got done. We got three fourths of the tanks done, that's really good." "Yeah, everybody down here is ecstatic, this is a terrific day," replied astronaut Daniel Burbank in space station mission control. "I know we threw some curve balls at you by pushing on for that third tank. But again, we think it went terrifically and we really appreciate all your help and flexibility." The only glitch glitch came during installation of the first high-pressure oxygen tank. When it was tied into the airlock's internal plumbing, flight controllers expected to see oxygen pressure jump from 900 psi to 3,000 psi. It didn't. After a bit of troubleshooting, engineers realized a mis-labeled valve inside the airlock was not in the proper position. When the valve was opened, the pressure shot up as desired. Today's excursion began at 11:04 p.m. It ended at 5:33 a.m. for a duration of six hours and 29 minutes. It was the 106th spacewalk by American astronauts, the 66th in shuttle program history and the 23rd devoted to space station assembly. Twenty four astronauts and two Russian cosmonauts have now logged 151 hours and 37 minutes in station construction spacewalks. =================================================================== Third spacewalk to install final gas tank (07/20-21/01) 01:00 a.m., 7/20/01, Update: Station astronauts look forward to homecoming The space station's new $164 million airlock has been checked out and cleared for use in a spacewalk early Saturday, the first such excursion staged from the new module. While engineers are still assessing long-term plans for stopping a tiny bit of air leakage between the airlock's inner and outer chambers, lead flight director Paul Hill said the new module is in good shape and ready for use. If all goes well, astronauts Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly will begin the planned four-hour spacewalk at 12:09 a.m. Saturday. "We've been training and planning for this for four years and we're really looking forward to that," Gernhardt said during a news conference Thursday night. "We're really happy things have gone well the last couple of days and we have the airlock in a posture that will support that EVA. "We're going to spend the rest of the day doing some final touches and then try to get a good night's sleep," he said. "It will be very exciting as we open the hatch and come out. As you know, the hatch is facing Earth so it'll be like stepping off into the big void, dropping down toward Earth, so we're looking forward to that. The airlock was installed during a spacewalk last Sunday. Gernhardt and Reilly then staged a second spacewalk overnight Tuesday to install three of four high-pressure gas tanks. During their third and final outing Saturday, the spacewalkers will install a final tank and float up to the station's main solar arrays to inspect a suspect bearing assembly. The new airlock has two chambers: A so-called equipment lock that butts up against the station's Unity module; and a smaller outer crew lock that provides an exit to space. While the crew lock looks small, Reilly said it's actually roomier than the shuttle's airlock. "The crew lock was designed so we could put both of us in there with our suits plus some hardware to take out to the station," he said. "That's one of the big reasons why the airlock is here. So it's a little more roomy than the one we have in the shuttle. A little bit of a difference, though, in that we don't have the tunnel extension we have in the shuttle, so we don't have quite the foot room we normally have when we're opening the hatches. "But it's about the same volume. It's a little bit larger in the circumference. ... As a comparison, it's pretty much like putting on all your winter clothes and standing in a closet with two people." The space station's three full-time crew members, meanwhile, are four-and-a-half months into a planned five-and-a-half month voyage. NASA astronauts James Voss and Susan Helms said Thursday they're both looking forward to coming home next month. But first, they plan to squeeze in some final quality time over the next four weeks to savor the experience of space flight. "I thoroughly enjoyed my four months up here and I'm looking forward to the last month, both for the fact that I'm going home and because it'll be a relatively quiet time for us," said Voss. "We're preparing to go back home, but there are a few things I haven't done yet that I will want to do, some personal things experiencing space. "It's just been a tremendous experience up here, I've had a wonderful time with my crewmates, we've gotten a lot of work done, we've seen various crews come and go, we've seen the station grow and it's been a wonderful thing to work with our great team on the ground while we've been doing this." Helms agreed, saying "this has been the most amazing space experience of my astronaut career so far." "These four months, which have gone by pretty quickly, have been spectacular from the standpoint of doing some great work and having some great life experiences," she said. "The training up to this spaceflight was also a great life experience because of the requirement to integrate with the Russian culture, and that has been also a big positive in my life. "We do have a month left," she added. "We were talking about that around the breakfast table this morning, it is coming fast, the end of the line is coming very fast, and maybe a little bit too fast for my tastes." 08:30 p.m., 07/20/01, Update: Astronauts gear up for third spacewalk Astronauts James Reilly and Michael Gernhardt are gearing up for a third spacewalk, the first to use the international space station's newly installed $164 million airlock. The spacewalk is scheduled to begin a few minutes past midnight, but the astronauts said Thursday they plan to take their time with preparations and observers should not be surprised if Gernhardt and Reilly are a bit late floating out the hatch. The goal of this evening's excursion is to attach a high-pressure nitrogen tank to the hull of the airlock, to stow a no-longer-needed laboratory power cable and to inspect an apparently sticking bearing assembly at the base of one of the station's two main solar arrays. The spacewalk is expected to last just four-and-a-half hours. The new airlock was attached to the station's Unity module early Sunday. Three high-pressure gas tanks - two filled with oxygen and one with nitrogen - were attached to the airlock during a second spacewalk overnight Tuesday. The airlock will enable space station crews to stage repair and maintenance spacewalks between shuttle visits, using either Russian or U.S. spacesuits. The new airlock module features two chambers, a large "equipment lock" that butts up against the Unity hatch and a smaller crew lock that is actually taken down to vacuum for a spacewalk. A downward facing hatch is located at the far end of the crew lock. "It will be very exciting as we open the hatch and come out," Gernhardt said late Thursday. "As you know, the hatch is facing Earth so it'll be like stepping off into the big void, dropping down toward Earth, so we're looking forward to that. We've got one more tank to put on to complete the mission objectives and some little clean up tasks, so it should be a nice nominal EVA and we're really looking forward to it." For identification, Gernhardt will be wearing a spacesuit with red stripes around its legs. Reilly's spacesuit is all white. Here's a timeline of this evening's activities (in EST and mission elapsed time): TIME.......DD...HH...MM...EVENT 07/20/01 05:04 PM...08...12...00...Crew wakeup 06:34 PM...08...13...30...Daily planning conference 07:04 PM...08...14...00...EVA-3: Setup 07:34 PM...08...14...30...EVA-3: Spacewalk preparations begin 08:44 PM...08...15...40...Airlock depress to 10.2 psi 10:14 PM...08...17...10...Orbiter space vision system powerup 10:24 PM...08...17...20...EVA-3: Spacesuit purge 10:24 PM...08...17...20...Shuttle robot arm powerup 10:39 PM...08...17...35...EVA-3: Spacesuit oxygen pre-breathe 11:39 PM...08...18...35...EVA-3: Crew lock depressurization begins 11:39 PM...08...18...35...ISS: Helms grapples nitrogen tank with SSRMS 07/21/01 12:09 AM...08...19...05...EVA-3: Crew lock egress 12:09 AM...08...19...05...ISS: crew meal 12:24 AM...08...19...20...EVA-3: Sortie setup 12:49 AM...08...19...45...Payload bay IMAX operations 12:54 AM...08...19...50...EVA-3: Nitrogen tank installation 01:04 AM...08...20...00...ISS: Helms unberths nitrogen tank 01:24 AM...08...20...20...ISS: Helms ungrapples tank 02:14 AM...08...21...10...ISS: Arm moved to stow position 02:39 AM...08...21...35...EVA-3: Reilly installs FRGF cover 02:49 AM...08...21...45...EVA-3: Gernhardt stows lab LTA cable 03:14 AM...08...22...10...Shuttle robot arm powerdown 03:19 AM...08...22...15...EVA-3: Reilly BMRRM inspection 03:24 AM...08...22...20...Nitrogen tank activation 03:29 AM...08...22...25...Space vision system powerdown 03:34 AM...08...22...30...EVA-3: Sortie cleanup 04:34 AM...08...23...30...EVA-3: Crew lock ingress 04:54 AM...08...23...50...EVA-3: Crew lock repressurization 06:34 AM...09...01...30...Oxygen repress 07:34 AM...09...02...30...ISS: Daily planning conference 09:04 AM...09...04...00...Crew sleep begins A more detailed summary flight plan update is available in Adobe Acrobat format, along with a detailed spacewalk timeline. Revision H of the NASA television schedule is posted below. =================================================================== Third spacewalk staged from station's new airlock (07/21/01) 12:40 a.m., 7/21/01, Update: Spacewalk begins Floating in the international space station's new airlock, astronauts Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly switched their spacesuits to internal battery power at 12:35 a.m. to officially begin their third spacewalk, the first from the station's new portal to space. The spacewalk began about a half hour later than planned because it took longer than expected for the airlock to vent all the way to vacuum. "And on this historic anniversary of the first moonwalk, it's a real honor for the integrated shuttle and space crews, along with the flight control team, to usher in a new era of spacewalking from the international space station," Gernhardt said as he floated out of the airlock. For the statistically minded, this is the 107th spacewalk by U.S. astronauts and the 24th dedicated to space station assembly. It is the second staged from the space station but the first from its new joint airlock. Not counting tonight's excursion, 24 U.S. astronauts and two Russian cosmonauts have spent 151 hours and 37 minutes carrying out spacewalks to build the international station. This morning's spacewalk to install a high-pressure nitrogen tank on the new airlock and to carry out a few other minor tasks is expected to last about four-and-a-half hours. "That is quite a view coming out," Reilly commented. "Yeah, really it's straight down," Gernhardt replied. "You get a sense of falling, don't you?" 06:30 a.m., 7/21/01, Update: Airlock deemed operational after smooth spacewalk Astronauts Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly wrapped up the first spacewalk staged from the international space station's new airlock early today, a $164 million module that "opens the door" for continued assembly of the huge orbital outpost. One year ago, reflected flight director Paul Hill, the space station was composed of the Russian FGB propulsion module and NASA's Unity connecting node. "It was 76 feet long and weighed 35 tons," he said. "We'll leave an ISS that's as long as a 17-story building is tall and weighs 131 tons. "Measured in total tonnage, we're about halfway finished building ISS and we're now ready to build out the truss. With its now fully operational (robot) arm and airlock, ISS will now be an equal partner with shuttle in continuing that construction." Today's spacewalk, the third and final excursion planned during the shuttle Atlantis' mission, began at 12:35 a.m. and ended at 4:37 a.m. for a duration of four hours and two minutes. If all goes well, Atlantis will undock from the station around 12:54 a.m. Sunday and land back at the Kennedy Space Center around 12:34 a.m. Tuesday. Along with attaching a fourth and final high-pressure air tank to the new airlock's hull during their third spacewalk, Gernhardt and Reilly stowed a no-longer needed lab module power cable and floated to the top of the P6 solar array to inspect a suspect bearing assembly. They did not see any obvious problems. They also inspected a device called the Floating Potential Probe, designed to measure the station's electrical charge. The device has worked erratically since its installation and Gernhardt and Reilly reported today its status lights were not illuminated. The spacewalkers then returned to the Quest airlock module, hooked their spacesuits to station power and began repressurization procedures. Today's EVA was the 107th by U.S. astronauts and the 24th devoted to space station assembly. Twenty-four NASA astronauts and two Russian cosmonauts have now logged 155 hours and 39 minutes in space station assembly EVAs. The only anomaly occurred during the airlock's initial depressurization, when it took about 40 minutes to go from five pounds per square inch to vacuum. Engineers expected it to take six to seven minutes. Station flight director Mark Kirasich said an external inspection of the airlock's main vent revealed no obvious signs of blockage "so we're scratching our head and we have a little bit more work to do on figuring out why that happened." Hill said engineers may opt to have a future crew replace the valve. For their part, Gernhardt and Reilly were pleased with the performance of the new airlock. Before returning to the module's outer chamber, they took time out to radio down a lengthy thank you to engineers and flight controllers. "Before we conclude this EVA, JIm and I would both like to say thanks to the thousands of people who worked so hard to make this mission come together and be the success that it is," Gernhardt said. After personally thanking a long list of supporters in an Oscars-like tribute, he concluded by saying "I'd like to tell those people they have built a very excellent airlock, everything worked great. The spaces are much bigger than the shuttle's, it's going to add a great capability for crews to do space station maintenance." Reilly also chimed in, saying "Thanks to everybody, thanks to our families, it was a great flight." "Those were some great words," astronaut Daniel Burbank replied from Houston. "And from all of us down here, we'd like to thank you guys. You did a great job on the first space station-based EVA, you inaugurated the airlock in great fashion. It was just a joy to watch from down here." Shuttle Atlantis' commander Steven Lindsey added a few words of his own, passing on congratulations to Burbank and the space station mission control team "for running their first EVA on the space station with, I'm sure, many, many more to follow." With attachment of the station's robot arm in April and the airlock during Atlantis' mission, the space station is on the threshold of a new era, one in which on-board crews will play an increasing role in the lab's outfitting and assembly. "Now that we have those," Hill said, "the gate is wide open for us to keep right on building," "You know, some of us felt like we weren't ever going to get here, that it just seemed like something that we were always going to keep working towards that was in the future," he told reporters early today. "And now we're going away and station's this huge thing. It almost boggles the mind when you see it in the video or the crew sees it out the window how big this thing's gotten. "And to think that in a couple of years, after we've built out to the alpha joints and added the rest of the solar modules, when this thing flies over - during the daylight - you'll be able to look up for the first time and see a man-made object flying through the sky with the naked eye. That's pretty significant. We're halfway there and this opens the door up for that becoming reality." The station's Canadarm2 spacecrane and the new airlock will not be used again until March when a shuttle crew delivers the first segment of a huge truss assembly that ultimately will carry the station's solar arrays. =================================================================== Shuttle undocks from space station (07/22/01) The shuttle Atlantis undocked from the international space station early today, leaving a new $164 million airlock module behind to give station crews a sophisticated portal to open space. With shuttle pilot Charles Hobaugh at the controls, Atlantis undocked on time at 12:54 a.m., pushed away by powerful springs in the station's docking mechanism. Hobaugh flew Atlantis through a slow loop around the station before departing for good, giving an IMAX camera in the shuttle's cargo bay an opportunity to film the outpost against the backdrop of Earth. "Atlantis gave us some great views of the international space station we've spent two-and-a-half years building," said lead flight director Paul Hill. "We undocked right on time and Charlie Hobaugh performed a really smooth backout and fly around. Just like the rendezvous, the propellant usage was less than predicted. This wraps up our 10th shuttle mission to the ISS and like all the others, it was fully successful. Weather permitting, we'll have Atlantis back in Florida Monday night." The shuttle astronauts face a light schedule for the rest of the day. Commander Steven Lindsey, Hobaugh and flight engineer Janet Kavandi plan to test the shuttle's re-entry systems overnight Sunday while their crewmates pack for the flight back to Earth. If all goes well, Lindsey will guide the shuttle to a landing back at the Kennedy Space Center around 12:37 a.m. Tuesday. The station's three-person crew, meanwhile - Expedition Two commander Yury Usachev, Susan Helms and James Voss - face a busy two weeks packing up and getting the station ready for its next full time crew. Expedition Three commander Frank Culbertson, Vladimir Dezhurov and Mikhail Tyurin are scheduled to blast off aboard the shuttle Discovery on Aug. 9. Usachev, Voss and Helms will return to Earth aboard Discovery on Aug. 21 after 166 days in space. =================================================================== Shuttle landing delayed by weather (07/23-24/01) 02:35 a.m., 07/23/01, Update: Astronauts rig Atlantis for entry The Atlantis astronauts tested the shuttle's re-entry systems Sunday night and began packing up for the flight back to Earth early Tuesday to close out NASA's latest space station assembly mission. Touchdown is targeted for 12:37 a.m. Tuesday. "We had our flight control system checkout earlier this morning, or this evening rather, everything went very well," entry flight director Wayne Hale said early today. "We picked up no significant anomalies at all. There is very little at all to speak of going on with the shuttle. We're looking forward to a nominal landing tomorrow." Forecasters are predicting somewhat marginal conditions, with rain showers within 30 nautical miles. Winds and cloud cover are expected to be within allowable limits. Forecasters are hopeful the heavier weather will move to the north of the Kennedy Space Center and that conditions will be acceptable for a landing during one of the shuttle's two opportunities. If not, Atlantis' crew will simply remain in orbit an extra day and try again overnight Tuesday. The shuttle has enough on-board fuel and other supplies to remain in orbit until Thursday night, if necessary. But Florida's weather is expected to improve as the week wears on and at this point, NASA managers do not plan to staff Edwards Air Force Base, Calif. "We've elected not to call up any of our backup landing sites ... due to the fact that we have three full days of extension capability with the fuel cells and propellant and so forth, and therefore could land as late as Thursday evening, early Friday morning," Hale said. "So we will try for a couple of days Kennedy only. And we're looking very good to get in there." Here are the latest numbers for landings overnight Monday and Tuesday: ORBIT....DEORBIT IGNITION....LANDING.........SITE 07/23-24 185......11:29:27 p.m........12:36:46 a.m....Kennedy Space Center 186......01:07:55 a.m........02:14:02 a.m....KSC 07/24-25 200......10:35:00 p.m........11:39:00 p.m....KSC 201......12:12:00 a.m........01:15:00 a.m....KSC Assuming the weather cooperates, here is the crew's timeline for a landing on the first opportunity: 04:04 PM......Crew wakeup 07:29 PM......Begin deorbit timeline 07:44 PM......Radiator stow 07:54 PM......Mission specialists seat installation 08:00 PM......Flight computers set for deorbit prep 08:04 PM......Hydraulic system configuration 08:29 PM......Flash evaporator checkout 08:35 PM......Final payload deactivation 08:49 PM......Payload bay doors closed 08:59 PM......Mission control 'go' for OPS-3 entry software load 09:09 PM......OPS-3 entry software loaded 09:34 PM......Entry switchlist verification 09:44 PM......Deorbit PAD update 09:49 PM......Crew entry review 10:04 PM......Commander, pilot don entry suits 10:21 PM......Inertial measurement unit alignment 10:29 PM......Commander, pilot strap in; mission specialists don suits 10:46 PM......Shuttle steering check 10:49 PM......Auxilliary power unit prestart 10:56 PM......Toilet deactivation 11:04 PM......Payload bay vent doors closed for entry 11:09 PM......Mission control 'go' for deorbit burn 11:15 PM......Mission specialists seat ingress 11:24 PM......Single APU start 11:29 PM......TDRS-West acquisition of signal 11:29:27 PM...Deorbit ignition 11:33:44 PM...Deorbit burn complete 12:04:46 AM...Entry interface 12:16:38 AM...55-degree left roll command 12:30:10 AM...Velocity less than mach 2.5 12:32:17 AM...Velocity less than mach 1 12:33:15 AM...Shuttle on the HAC 12:36:46 AM...Landing These numbers will be updated as warranted after entry flight director Wayne Hale briefs reporters on landing plans at 2 a.m. Monday. 11:30 p.m., 07/23/01, Update: Shuttle entry delayed due to approaching showers The shuttle Atlantis' return to Earth was delayed one orbit this evening because of concern about an approaching band of showers. Touchdown is now targeted for 2:14 a.m. Conditions at the Kennedy Space Center were acceptable as the moment approached for a deorbit rocket firing to set up a 12:37 a.m. landing, but forecasters told entry flight director Wayne Hale an approaching line showers to the southeast likely would be within 30 nautical miles of the shuttle's runway at landing time, violating NASA's conservative flight rules. As a result, shuttle skipper Steven Lindsey was told to delay entry for one orbit to give the showers time to dissipate. If the weather cooperates, Atlantis' twin braking rockets will be fired at 1:08 a.m. for a touchdown on runway 15 at 2:14 a.m. If the showers don't break up, however, landing will be delayed 24 hours to around 11:39 p.m. Tuesday. The shuttle has enough on-board fuel and other supplies to remain in orbit until Thursday if worse came to worse. But forecasters say conditions should improve dramatically overnight, giving the crew good odds of making it back to Florida. 01:00 a.m., 7/24/01, Update: Shuttle landing delayed 24 hours A persistent band of approaching rain showers forced entry flight director Wayne Hale to wave off two back-to-back landing attempts for the shuttle Atlantis, delaying the ship's return to Earth until Tuesday night when the crew will have two more opportunities to land in Florida. "The current obs (observation) is no go, the forecast is not favorable and we're going to go ahead and stand down and try again tomorrow (Tuesday night)," astronaut Gus Loria radioed the crew from Houston. Atlantis has enough fuel and other supplies to remain in orbit until Thursday morning in a worst-case scenario, but forecasters predict good weather tonight and flight controllers are optimistic about getting Atlantis back to Earth. Commander Steven Lindsey, pilot Charles Hobaugh, flight engineer Janet Kavandi and spacewalkers Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly will have two back-to-back landing opportunities on successive orbits. For the first attempt, the crew would fire the shuttle's twin braking rockets at 10:32 p.m. for a touchdown at 11:39 p.m. The second landing opportunity is at 1:15 a.m. Hale said early Monday he had no plans to activate NASA's backup landing site at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., for this evening's entry attempts. But that could change based on updated forecasts later today. If landing is delayed to Wednesday, however, Edwards almost certainly will be activated as a backup. Here are all of the shuttle's landing opportunities for Tuesday night through Thursday morning: ORBIT.SITE...DEORBIT BURN...LANDING Tuesday night/Wednesday morning: 200...KSC....10:32 p.m......11:39 p.m. 201...KSC....12:08 a.m......01:15 a.m. 202...EDW....01:39 a.m......02:46 a.m. 203...EDW....03:16 a.m......04:22 a.m. Wednesday night/Thursday morning: 215...KSC....09:37 p.m......10:41 p.m. 216...KSC....11:13 p.m......12:17 a.m. 217...EDW....12:45 a.m......01:48 a.m. 218...EDW....02:21 a.m......03:24 a.m. =================================================================== Shuttle Atlantis returns to Earth (07/24-25/01) Running a day late because of bad weather, the shuttle Atlantis returned to Earth this evening, dropping out of a hazy Florida sky for a smooth nighttime landing on the Kennedy Space Center's 3-mile-long shuttle runway. With commander Steven Lindsey and pilot Charles Hobaugh at the controls, Atlantis touched down on runway 15 at 11:38:55 p.m. to cap a 13-day mission spanning 5.3 million miles and 200 complete orbits. "Wheels stopped, Houston," Lindsey reported as the shuttle rolled to a halt. "Atlantis, Houston, roger. It looked like an outstanding landing after an outstanding mission," replied astronaut Gus Loria from mission control. "Well done, Steve, to you and your crew." Lindsey, Hobaugh, flight engineer Janet Kavandi, Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly plan to take a day off in Florida Wednesday before flying back to the Johnson Space Center in Houston Thursday afternoon. This was the 18th night landing in shuttle history, the 13th at the Kennedy Space Center. Mission duration was 12 days 18 hours 34 minutes and 56 seconds. Atlantis' flight, the 105th in shuttle history, was the 10th devoted to assembly of the international space station. Lindsey and company delivered and installed a $164 million airlock module, staging three spacewalks by Gernhardt and Reilly to outfit and activate the chamber. Twenty-three U.S. astronauts, two Russians and one Canadian have now spent 155 hours and 39 minutes carrying out 24 space station assembly spacewalks since construction began in November 1998. The station now measures roughly 170 feet long and masses 130 tons. Installation of the Quest airlock marked the completion of what NASA calls Phase Two of space station assembly. With the airlock module in place, station crews can stage maintenance and repair spacewalks using U.S. or Russian spacesuits when the space shuttle is not present. "I couldn't be more pleased with the way this mission went," said shuttle program manager Ronald Dittemore. "Sometimes I have to pinch myself and remind myself that I'm not dreaming, things have been going so well for us. It was a great mission and we accomplished just what we intended to do." One year ago, Dittemore said, "we set a goal for ourselves that within 12 months we wanted to build the station to the point of having the airlock up and functioning. And here we are today having completed that. "A year ago, we knew we certainly risked having some challenges along the way," he said. "We would never have dreamed it would have gone so well. We thought we would have other learning experiences, but we haven't. I'm very proud of the team." Next up for NASA: Launch of shuttle Discovery on Aug. 9 to ferry supplies to the space station, along with its next three-man crew. The station's current crew - Expedition Two commander Yury Usachev, Susan Helms and James Voss - will return to Earth aboard Discovery around Aug. 21 to wrap up a 166-day mission. "Discovery is on the launch pad, it's processing is going well, we feel comfortable abouty pressing toward Aug. 9," Dittemore said. "We'll have our flight readiness review Aug. 1 and I can tell you we're not working any significant problems. So I think that's going to go smoothly and we're in good shape for that next launch." The Expedition Two crew's replacements - Expedition Three commander Frank Culbertson, Vladimir Dezhurov and Mikhail Turin - will return to Earth in early December. ===================================================================