Astronauts Haul Cargo, Prepare for Spacewalk

Astronaut Joan Higginbotham, STS-116 mission specialist and loadmaster, looks over procedures checklists in a hatch on space shuttle Discovery during flight day three activities. CREDIT: NASA.

HOUSTON -- Astronauts aboard NASA's shuttle Discovery and the International Space Station (ISS) are hauling cargo between their two spacecraft today while preparing for an extra spacewalk to pack away a half-furled solar array atop the orbital laboratory.

As Discovery's loadmaster, STS-116 mission specialist Joan Higginbotham, is overseeing the transfer of supplies and equipment between the shuttle and ISS, though each of her crewmates have at least some cargo duties today [image].

"The majority of this shift is probably going to be dedicated primarily to transfer activities," ISS flight director Joel Montalbano said here at NASA's Johnson Space Center in a morning status update. "If you add it all up, it's about 30 crew hours today and this will put us back probably around 95 percent or so of completed transfer."

When Discovery launched towards the space station on Dec. 9, it carried 4,107 pounds (1,862 kilograms) of supplies, equipment and other hardware tucked in the Spacehab module mounted within its payload bay, with another 1,107 pounds (502 kilograms) of cargo riding up inside the orbiter's middeck, NASA officials have said. The Discovery crew is due to return to Earth with about 2,998 pounds (1,359 kilograms) of unneeded items from ISS inside the Spacehab module while packing away about 727 pounds (329 kilograms) of material in their shuttle's middeck.

NASA officials have scheduled about 100 crew hours of cargo transfer time altogether for Discovery's STS-116 mission [image].

"This team is cooking on all cylinders" Montalbano said. "They're all doing a great job."

Spacewalkers prepare

In addition to hauling cargo, Discovery spaceflyers Robert Curbeam and Christer Fuglesang, of the European Space Agency (ESA), will prime their NASA spacesuits today for a Monday extravehicular activity (EVA) specifically aimed at furling a stubborn solar array atop the space station's mast-like Port 6 (P6) truss.

Mission managers added the spacewalk to the shuttle crew's busy schedule late Saturday after efforts to shake the solar array appeared successful, though Curbeam and his spacewalking partner Sunita Williams ultimately ran out of time to coax the array into its storage boxes [image].

Fuglesang and his crewmates awoke today at 9:17 a.m. EST (1417 GMT) to the "Blue Danube Waltz," a song featured in the science fiction film 2001: A Space Odyssey but chosen for the ESA astronaut for other reasons.

"Good morning, I guess my wife chose that song, probably from our wedding day when we danced to this nice waltz," said Fuglesang of his wife Elisabeth.

"Well you can think about tomorrow as you dance out the airlock and start your EVA again," NASA astronaut Shannon Lucid, serving as spacecraft communicator in Mission Control

"I'll do that, it feels like dancing out there," Fuglesang, who will make the third spacewalk of his astronaut career Monday, said.

Curbeam will be the first shuttle astronaut to perform four spacewalks in a single orbiter flight, but is a veteran of extravehicular activity and currently ranks 13^th on the list of all-time spacewalkers, NASA officials said Saturday.

Tricia Mack, NASA's lead spacewalk officer for Discovery's STS-116 mission, said the two astronauts will perform a series of standard pre-spacewalk activities, among them: charging their NASA spacesuit batteries, going over procedures and an evening "campout" in the space station's Quest airlock to reduce the amount of time spent breathing pure oxygen to purge nitrogen from their bloodstreams. Astronauts purge nitrogen from their systems as a preventative measure against developing decompression sickness, also known as the bends, while working inside their lower pressure spacesuits.

Mission managers called on the shuttle astronauts to pick through Discovery's tool box for any generic items that might prove useful during Monday's spacewalk, Mack said. Any items tapped as a possible tool during the solar array shaking spacewalk will have to be wrapped in Kapton tape as a safety measure, she added.

The space station's robotic arm will also be moved into a position that will allow astronauts wider access to the troublesome solar array, NASA officials said.

Discovery shuttle pilot William Oefelein, who also serves as the intravehicular activity choreographer for the STS-116 spacewalks, will oversee a review this evening to go over tomorrow's planned EVA, she added.

"We'll be ready to go Monday," Mack said.

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