HOUSTON - NASA officially
extended the flight of its first space shuttle mission since the Columbia
disaster, giving astronauts an extra day at the International Space Station
(ISS) to move spare equipment and water into the orbital facility.
The space shuttle Discovery
will stay docked while its STS-114 crew cobbles together excess shuttle supplies
for transfer into the station, mission managers said during a Saturday
briefing.
"We'll sure appreciate
getting that extra day," said NASA space station program manager William Gerstenmaier
during the briefing here at Johnson Space Center (JSC).
The extra time
will allow Discovery's crew to gather a few hundred pounds of items from around
the spacecraft - including laptop computers, tools, pens, paper, printers and
an additional 20-day supply of water - for use on the ISS since the STS-114
mission may be the last shuttle flight to visit the ISS until NASA solves an external
tank foam
shedding problem seen during the orbiter's July 26 launch.
But that debris issue
should not affect Discovery's Earth return, now set for the early morning hours
of Aug. 8.
During the briefing, NASA
deputy shuttle program manager Wayne Hale also said that Discovery's
heat-resistant ceramic tiles and a loose thermal blanket have been given a
clean bill of health.
That clears 90 percent of
Discovery for the return flight to Earth, with the final analyses of its wing
leading edges expected Sunday to be followed a day later by aerodynamics
reports on a pair of gap fillers
jutting out from between the orbiter's belly-mounted tiles, he added.
"The orbiter is performing nearly
flawlessly," Hale said. "The crew is performing in just an awesome manner...we
had an outstanding EVA."
Earlier today, STS-114
mission specialists Soichi Noguchi and Stephen Robinson performed a six-hour
and 50-minute spacewalk
to test heat shield repair methods and perform ISS maintenance.
Discovery's STS-114 flight
is NASA's first shuttle mission since the loss of the seven STS-107 astronauts
aboard Columbia, which broke apart over Texas on Feb. 1, 2003.
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