New Launch Date Friday November 14th: 14 November 2008 17:55:00 EST
Atlantis Astronauts Gear Up for Risky Hubble Mission
The space shuttle Endeavour rolled out to a Florida launching pad early Friday to serve as a rescue craft for its sister ship Atlantis
in what is expected to be the last time in history that NASA has two orbiters in launch position at the same time.
NASA is preparing to launch seven astronauts aboard Atlantis next month on the final service call to the Hubble Space Telescope, where the spaceflyers plan to perform five back-to-back spacewalks to install new cameras, replace aging batteries, gyroscopes and other components, add a docking ring and make tricky repairs to equipment never designed for in-flight maintenance.
Making Hubble More Powerful Than Ever
A container packed with the spare parts and new instruments for Hubble will be delivered to Atlantis atop its launch pad late Saturday after a slight delay so engineers could clean up contamination in one of the cargo elements. The orbital overhaul is expected to extend the 18-year-old Hubble's mission through at least 2013.
This view shows storm clouds gathering over Launch Complex 39 at NASA's Kennedy Space Center on July 29th, 2008, a common occurrence at this time of the year in Florida. The 525-foot-tall Vehicle Assembly Building towers above the complex, in the center, with the Launch Control Center nestled at its base to the right. The turn basin is behind the trees, at right.
But unlike recent missions to the International Space Station, where shuttle crews had the option of awaiting rescue aboard the outpost if their spacecraft suffered critical heat shield damage, Atlantis astronauts have no such safety net because they must fly higher and in a different orbit than the station to reach Hubble.
Instead, NASA plans to have Endeavour and a skeleton crew of four astronauts standing by in the unlikely event Atlantis' heat shield is damaged beyond repair and the orbiter is unable to return to Earth. Under that plan, Endeavour would rendezvous with Atlantis and astronauts would stage a series of three spacewalks to retrieve the Hubble astronauts before discarding the stricken spacecraft.
"They would come up and they'd rendezvous with us," explained Atlantis shuttle pilot Gregory C. Johnson in a NASA interview. "We would grapple each other, robotic arm to robotic arm, essentially, and then would transfer crew members between the shuttles."
NASA mission managers and Atlantis astronauts consider the rescue plan an extremely unlikely scenario and are confident their mission will go as planned. Once Atlantis and its crew return safely to Earth, NASA will move Endeavour from Pad 39B to Pad 39A for its planned Nov. 12 launch to haul fresh supplies and equipment to the International Space Station.
Service Mission 4: The essentials
Cool SM4 Pictures
Consider the following "What might have been". The Hubble Servicing Mission has been rescheduled for February. The mission of STS-126 is to deliver supplies to the ISS.For years, STS-126 has been planned as the mission that will give the International Space Station the ability to support twice the crew currently living there.
Atlantis Astronauts Gear Up for Risky Hubble Mission
The space shuttle Endeavour rolled out to a Florida launching pad early Friday to serve as a rescue craft for its sister ship Atlantis
in what is expected to be the last time in history that NASA has two orbiters in launch position at the same time.
NASA is preparing to launch seven astronauts aboard Atlantis next month on the final service call to the Hubble Space Telescope, where the spaceflyers plan to perform five back-to-back spacewalks to install new cameras, replace aging batteries, gyroscopes and other components, add a docking ring and make tricky repairs to equipment never designed for in-flight maintenance.
Making Hubble More Powerful Than Ever
A container packed with the spare parts and new instruments for Hubble will be delivered to Atlantis atop its launch pad late Saturday after a slight delay so engineers could clean up contamination in one of the cargo elements. The orbital overhaul is expected to extend the 18-year-old Hubble's mission through at least 2013.
This view shows storm clouds gathering over Launch Complex 39 at NASA's Kennedy Space Center on July 29th, 2008, a common occurrence at this time of the year in Florida. The 525-foot-tall Vehicle Assembly Building towers above the complex, in the center, with the Launch Control Center nestled at its base to the right. The turn basin is behind the trees, at right.
But unlike recent missions to the International Space Station, where shuttle crews had the option of awaiting rescue aboard the outpost if their spacecraft suffered critical heat shield damage, Atlantis astronauts have no such safety net because they must fly higher and in a different orbit than the station to reach Hubble.
Instead, NASA plans to have Endeavour and a skeleton crew of four astronauts standing by in the unlikely event Atlantis' heat shield is damaged beyond repair and the orbiter is unable to return to Earth. Under that plan, Endeavour would rendezvous with Atlantis and astronauts would stage a series of three spacewalks to retrieve the Hubble astronauts before discarding the stricken spacecraft.
"They would come up and they'd rendezvous with us," explained Atlantis shuttle pilot Gregory C. Johnson in a NASA interview. "We would grapple each other, robotic arm to robotic arm, essentially, and then would transfer crew members between the shuttles."
NASA mission managers and Atlantis astronauts consider the rescue plan an extremely unlikely scenario and are confident their mission will go as planned. Once Atlantis and its crew return safely to Earth, NASA will move Endeavour from Pad 39B to Pad 39A for its planned Nov. 12 launch to haul fresh supplies and equipment to the International Space Station.
Service Mission 4: The essentials
Cool SM4 Pictures
STS-125/Atlantis
Target Launch Date: October 14
Target Launch Time: 12:43 a.m. EDT
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