Discovery astronauts begin first spacewalk
HOUSTON (AP) - June 3, 2008 During a scheduled 6½ hour spacewalk, astronauts Michael Fossum
and Ronald Garan Jr. will prep the $1 billion lab, named Kibo -
Japanese for hope - for installation by removing power and heating
cables and various restraints that connect it to the shuttle.
Later in the day, astronauts working from inside will use the
space station's robot arm to lift the lab from the shuttle and
anchor it to the station.
The start of the spacewalk was delayed nearly an hour as a
faulty communications cap - which allows spacewalkers to talk with
other crew members and controllers on the ground - was replaced in
Fossum's spacesuit.
"We're looking forward to a great day, an exciting day to
install the Japanese Kibo module," said Japanese astronaut Akihiko
Hoshide, who will help move the lab with the station's robotic arm.
Kibo, at 37 feet long, is bigger than the U.S. and European labs
already attached to the space station. The Japanese lab also has a
pair of robot arms, the larger of which flew up on this shuttle
mission.
A separate storage room loaded with Kibo equipment went up in
March. A porch for outdoor science experiments and the smaller
robot arm will fly next year.
The spacewalkers were also going to remove a 50-foot inspection
boom from the orbiting complex and try out some cleaning methods on
a jammed solar rotating joint that has hampered energy production
at the space station since last fall. The joint enables the space
station's solar arrays, which provide electrical power, to rotate
and track the sun.
"It's going to lead to a really busy day for all of those
guys," said Emily Nelson, a space station flight director.
The first job for the spacewalk will be transferring the boom
from the space station to the shuttle.
The laser-equipped boom is usually attached to the shuttle's
robotic arm and used to conduct a detailed inspection of the
spacecraft's wings and nose. The inspection is one of the safety
measures put in place by NASA after the 2003 Columbia accident to
check for launch damage.
Discovery didn't have enough room for the inspection boom; Kibo
filled the entire payload bay. So the last shuttle crew left one
behind at the space station in March.
The shuttle astronauts, who arrived at the space station on
Monday, will use the boom next week to check Discovery for any
damage that could endanger them during re-entry.
Imagery experts, in the meantime, are poring over the 302
digital pictures that the space station crew took of Discovery's
belly right before the docking.
About five pieces of foam insulation broke off Discovery's
external fuel tank during liftoff, but are not believed to have
caused any damage.
NASA, meanwhile, is investigating the worst launch pad damage in
27 years of space shuttle flight.
A large section of the flame trench - 20 feet by 75 feet - broke
apart, and chunks of the large heat-resistant fire bricks and
concrete mortar were scattered all the way past the chain-link
fence 1,800 feet away. The fence was damaged in places.
None of the debris appeared to hit Discovery, said LeRoy Cain,
chairman of the mission management team.
The flame trench - dating back to the 1960s Apollo era and
designed to deflect the exhaust of the booster rockets - is
inspected regularly and undergoes periodic repair, Cain said.
NASA does not need to use the pad again until the next shuttle
launch in October. That mission - the final trip to the Hubble
Space Telescope - should not be delayed as a result of the damage,
Cain said.
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