Astronauts
aboard the space shuttle Discovery will inspect their spacecraft's vital heat shield
for damage today as they head toward the International Space Station.
One day
after their spectacular
evening launch, shuttle commander Lee Archambault and his seven-astronaut
crew plan to use a sensor-laden inspection pole to scan Discovery's wing edges
and nose for signs of new dings or divots.
"We didn't
see anything at all in the first quick look," NASA's space operations chief
Bill Gerstenmaier said of Discovery's heat shield after the shuttle launched
into space Sunday night. "It looked pretty clean."
The heat
shield inspection is scheduled to begin at about 2:28 p.m. EDT (1828 GMT) and
is the first of several in-flight surveys to search for damage to Discovery's
fragile heat-resistant tiles and panels from launch debris. It has been a
standard practice since the 2003 loss of the shuttle Columbia during re-entry
due to heat shield damage.
"This is
about 5 1/2 to six hours of inspection work using our space shuttle robotic
arm," Archambault said before flight.
Discovery
is headed to the International Space Station to deliver the outpost's final set
of U.S.-built
solar arrays and a nearly 16-ton girder to complete its power grid and
backbone-like main truss. The shuttle is also ferrying Japanese
astronaut Koichi Wakata to the space station, where he will replace NASA
astronaut Sandra Magnus as a member of the orbiting laboratory's crew.
Three
spacewalks are planned for the 13-day mission, which was delayed more than a
month, first by fuel valve concerns and later by a hydrogen gas leak last week.
Shuttle
health check
A team of
engineers is poring over video of Discovery's launch, but today's inspection is
the first up-close view they will have to check shuttle's heat shield health.
"The
inspection has become somewhat standard now," said Discovery pilot
Dominic "Tony" Antonelli before flight. "We'll grab this boom out of
the shuttle's payload bay. It's got sensors on the end and we'll use those
sensors to scan the leading edge and the nose are of the space shuttle to make
sure we didn't sustain any damage from ascent."
Antonelli,
a first-time spaceflyer, is Discovery's lead robotic arm operator. He will
attach the 50-foot (15-meter) inspection boom to the end of the shuttle's
already 50-foot (15-meter) robotic arm and use the tip-mounted cameras and
laser sensors to scan Discovery's nose and wing edges - areas that see the
highest temperatures during the scorching heat of re-entry.
"It's very
tedious work and you're operating the inspection boom within very close
proximity of the orbiter for an extended period of time," Archambault said,
adding that he and other crewmates will share the job with Antonelli to ease
the workload. "The idea here is not to let anyone get complacent and keep
everyone focused on the job at hand."
NASA has
kept a close watch on shuttle heat shield integrity since the 2003 loss of the
shuttle Columbia and its seven-astronaut crew during landing. A piece of foam
insulation from Columbia's fuel tank broke off during launch and punched a hole
in the shuttle's heat shield on its left wing edge, leading to the shuttle's
destruction during re-entry 16 days later.
Shuttle analysts
will study the images from today's inspection and combine them with data from
two more in-flight surveys of Discovery's heat shield scheduled during the 13-day
mission. Astronauts aboard the International Space Station will snap
high-resolution photos of Discovery's tile-covered underbelly just before the
shuttle docks on Tuesday in another survey. The last scan, performed after
undocking, will search for new dings etched by micrometeorites or other space
debris.
NASA flight
controllers told Discovery's crew late Sunday that, so far, the spacecraft
appears to be in fine shape after its evening liftoff.
"There
are no observations indicating any concern for the vehicle or success of the
mission," astronaut George Zamka radioed up to the shuttle from Mission
Control at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston.
Discovery
is due to dock at the space station on Tuesday at 5:13 p.m. EDT (2113 GMT).
SPACE.com
is providing continuous coverage of STS-119 with reporter Clara Moskowitz in
Cape Canaveral and senior editor Tariq Malik in New York. Click here for mission
updates and SPACE.com's live NASA TV video feed.
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