WASHINGTON - Seven astronauts and a European
laboratory are on track to rocket toward the International Space Station (ISS)
next month aboard NASA's shuttle Atlantis.
Commanded by
veteran spaceflyer Stephen Frick, Atlantis's
STS-122 crew are eager to haul the European Space Agency's (ESA) Columbus laboratory toward the ISS on Dec. 6.
"It will be
a very busy mission with also some spacewalks to do space station maintenance
tasks and who knows what else," Frick told reporters Friday during a series of
mission briefings at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston. "Space station
assembly missions, these days, are very dynamic."
Frick and
his crewmates plan to perform at least three spacewalks during their 11-day
mission to attach Columbus to the station's new Harmony node. The station's
Expedition 16 crew, commanded by NASA
astronaut Peggy Whitson, will perform two spacewalks of their own next week
to ensure Harmony
and the ISS are ready for December shuttle flight.
"As long as
we don't run into any major snags with these [spacewalks], the schedule will
support a Dec. 6 launch," said Kenny Todd, NASA's ISS integration and
operations manager, of the planned Nov. 20 and Nov. 24 excursions.
Delivered
by NASA shuttle astronauts last month, the Harmony node is designed to serve as
the anchor for Japan's three-segment Kibo module and the ESA's 1.4 billion Euro
(US$2 billion) Columbus lab, which will mark Europe's first permanently crewed science
facility to reach space.
"I'm very
proud that we will bring up Columbus, the biggest contribution of ESA to the
International Space Station," said Atlantis mission specialist Hans Schlegel,
an ESA astronaut from Germany.
Atlantis
mission specialist Leopold Eyharts, an ESA astronaut from France, will christen Columbus and stay aboard the space station as a new member of the Expedition
16 crew. He will replace U.S. astronaut Dan Tani, who will return to Earth with
the STS-122 crew.
Space
station joint inspection
NASA is also
drawing up plans for a late addition to the mission's third spacewalk that
would call for STS-122 mission specialist Rex Walheim to inspect a balky
solar wing joint on the station's starboard side. Mission managers may even
extend the flight two full days and add a fourth spacewalk to perform a more
in-depth inspection, NASA said Friday.
Spacewalkers
discovered metal grit inside the massive gear, known as the starboard Solar
Alpha Rotary Joint (SARJ), during NASA's STS-120
shuttle mission last month. After examining samples of grit that were returned
to Earth, engineers found them to be part of the gear's race ring that rotates
the station's starboard solar wings like a paddlewheel to continuously face the
sun.
"I think
we're still in more of the investigation stage, and that we can do using our
regular skills for regular tasks," Walheim told reporters today. "We'll just
have to be careful about it."
Atlantis
and its STS-122 crew have a slim, week-long window to launch toward the ISS
next month. The mission will be NASA's fourth shuttle flight of the year, the
largest number since the 2003 Columbia accident.
"We've been
really fortunate that things have been working so well for us," said NASA
shuttle program manager Wayne Hale, stressing that safety and not schedule
pressure will always be paramount. "This is a story of continuing to pay
attention to details and not stopping to pat ourselves on the back."
Hale added
that NASA shuttle managers will decide sometime this spring whether to proceed
with plans to pull the Atlantis shuttle out of service in 2008, or keep flying the spacecraft until the planned 2010 retirement of the entire three-orbiter fleet.
NASA plans
to replace its space shuttles with the capsule-based Orion Crew Exploration
Vehicle and its Ares I rockets as early as 2013.
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