Category Praxis Manned Spaceflight Log 1961-2006

Flight Crew

BLAHA, John Elmer, 51, USAF, commander. 4th mission Previous missions: STS-29 (1989); STS-33 (1989); STS-43 (1991) SEARFOSS, Richard Alan, 37, USAF, pilot

SEDDON, Margaret Rhea, 45, civilian, mission specialist 1, payload commander, 3rd mission

Previous missions: STS 51-D (1985); STS-40 (1991)

McARTHUR Jr., William Surles, 42, US Army, mission specialist 2 WOLF, David Alexander, 37, civilian, mission specialist 3 LUCID, Shannon Wells, 50, civilian, mission specialist 4, 4th mission Previous missions: STS 51-G (1985); STS-34 (1989); STS-43 (1991) FETTMAN, Martin Joseph, 36, civilian, payload specialist 1

Flight Log

The first attempt at launching STS-58 on 14 October was scrubbed at the T — 31 second mark, as a result of a failed range safety computer. The next attempt on 15 October was scrubbed at T — 9 minutes due to a failed S-band transponder aboard Columbia. The launch on 18 October was also delayed, but only by a few seconds due to an aircraft straying into the launch exclusion zone.

Over the next 14 days, the crew, working a single-shift system, conducted the SLS – 2 research programme and other research objectives, including the Orbiter Accelera­tion Research Experiments, SAREX, and Pilot In-flight Landing Operations Trainer (PILOT), a portable laptop computer simulator that allowed the commander and the pilot to maintain their proficiency for approach and landing on longer missions.

The SLS payload included 14 experiments focusing on four areas: regular physiology, cardiovascular/cardiopulmonary, musculoskeletal and neuro-science ex­periments. The Rotating Dome Experiment was used in conjunction with the first

flight prototype of the Astronaut Science Advisor (ASA), a laptop computer program designed to assist the crew member in conducting experiments to increase the efficiency of activities. This was also termed the “principle investigator in a box”. Of the fourteen experiments, eight focused on the astronauts, while the other six were conducted on the 48 rodents aboard. Six of the rodents were killed and dissected during the mission, yielding the first tissue samples collected during a space mission which were not altered by re-exposure to the Earth’s gravity.

During the mission, the crew collected over 650 different samples from the rodents and themselves. This greatly increased the database of life science research and this work continued, at least for the “payload crew’’ (Seddon, Fettman, Lucid and Wolf) after landing. For the first week after the end of the mission, these four astronauts gave regular blood and urine samples to reveal how the body readjusted to gravity after two weeks in space. The blood samples were collected over a period of 45 days after landing. The combined data from SLS-1 and SLS-2 helped to build a more compre­hensive picture of how animals and humans adapted to space flight and readapted to life back on Earth, an important milestone in developing protocols and research programmes for the space station. There were plans to fly a third SLS, which could have become a dedicated French Spacelab mission, but this was not pursued due to budget restrictions, launch manifest constraints and the introduction of the Shuttle- Mir programme, which drew resources away from Spacelab missions.

Milestones

164th manned space flight

88th US manned space flight

58th Shuttle mission

15th flight of Columbia

2nd flight of SLS series

9th Spacelab Long Module mission

Longest Shuttle mission to date

4th longest US spaceflight (after three Skylab missions) 1st veterinarian to fly in space (Fettman)

1st tissue samples collected during a space flight (rodents)

Flight Crew

COVEY, Richard Oswalt, 47, USAF, commander, 4th mission Previous missions: STS 51-I (1985); STS-26 (1988); STS-38 (1990)

BOWERSOX, Kenneth Duane, 37, USN, pilot, 2nd mission Previous mission: STS-50 (1992)

THORNTON, Kathryn Cordell Ryan, 41, civilian, mission specialist 1,

3rd mission

Previous missions: STS-33 (1989); STS-49 (1992)

NICOLLIER, Claude, 49, civilian, mission specialist 2, 2nd mission Previous mission: STS-46 (1992)

HOFFMAN, Jeffery Alan, 49, civilian, mission specialist 3, 4th mission Previous missions: STS 51-D (1985); STS-35 (1990); STS-46 (1992) MUSGRAVE, Franklin Story, 58, civilian, mission specialist 4, payload commander, 5th mission

Previous missions: STS-6 (1983); STS 51-F (1985); STS-33 (1989); STS-44 (1991) AKERS, Thomas Dale, 42, USAF, mission specialist 5, 3rd mission Previous missions: STS-41 (1990); STS-49 (1992)

Flight Log

Described as one of the most challenging manned missions ever attempted, the crew of STS-61 completed a record-breaking five back-to-back EVAs during the first on – orbit service of the Hubble Space Telescope. Many of their tasks were completed sooner than expected, allowing the few contingencies that did occur to be dealt with smoothly. The original launch was to have occurred from Pad 39A at KSC, but following the rollout of the stack to the pad, contamination was discovered in the payload change-out room. As a result, the STS-61 launch was moved to Pad B.

At an altitude of 522 km above the Earth, Musgrave (top) and Hoffman are seen riding on the RMS during the fifth and final EVA of the mission to service the Hubble Telescope, one of the most successful space missions to date. The west coast of Australia forms the backdrop to the scene

The move occurred without incident on 15 November but the first launch attempt on 1 December was scrubbed due to adverse weather conditions at the SLF.

A series of service missions had always been part of the HST programme. At regular intervals, a Shuttle would be sent to repair, replace or upgrade onboard instruments, equipment or systems prolonging the operational life of the facility and improving the quality and quantity of scientific discoveries over the planned fifteen – year life of the telescope. With the focusing difficulties encountered shortly after deployment from STS-31 in 1990, some media reports incorrectly labelled this flight as rescue mission, specially organised to save the telescope. The mission did restore the telescope to full working order, but the corrective optics were incorporated into a far more extensive, and already planned, servicing operation. Rendezvous with Hubble was achieved on FD 3, with the RMS grapple and berthing in the payload bay completed the same day. The telescope was berthed upright in the payload bay of the Shuttle, but remained under the command of the Space Telescope Operations Control Center (STOCC) located at the Goddard Space Flight Center. Following each servicing task, the STOCC controllers verified the interfaces between the new or serviced hardware and the telescope, ensuring at each stage that the telescope would be capable of independent operations once released from the payload bay.

Over a five-day period (4-8 December), the EVA team of four astronauts worked in pairs to complete the complex and demanding programme to restore the telescope to full working order. During the first EVA, four gyros that were situated in pairs in two Rate Sensing Units were replaced, along with two Electronic Control Units that directed the RSUs and eight electrical fuse plugs. The first EVA (7 hours 54 minutes on 4 Dec, conducted by Hoffman (EV1) and Musgrave (EV2)) was the second longest in the US programme to date and the only problem encountered was difficulty in closing the compartment doors after replacing the RSUs. During the next EVA (6 hours 36 minutes on 5 Dec, conducted by Thornton (EV3) and Akers (EV4)), one of the primary objectives of the servicing mission was completed, that of installing new solar arrays. The old arrays were scheduled to be returned to Earth for examination after over three years in space, but one of them refused to fully retract due to a kink in the framework and had to be jettisoned. The other was stowed in the payload bay without difficulty.

The third EVA (6 hours 47 minutes on 6 Dec, the second for Hoffman and Musgrave) was designed to replace the Wide Field/Planetary Camera (WF/PC), one of the five scientific instruments on the telescope, in a four-hour operation. In fact, the astronauts accomplished the exchange with the improved WF/PCII (an upgraded spare modified to compensate for the flawed mirror) in just forty minutes. Two magnetometers were also installed in the top of the telescope. EVA 4 (6 hours 50 minutes on 7 Dec, the second for Thornton and Akers) included the replacement of another primary instrument, the High-Speed Photometer, with the Corrective Optics for Telescope Axial Replacement (COSTAR) unit – often dubbed Hubble’s “spec­tacles” – which redirected light to three of the four remaining instruments, thus compensating for the flaw in the primary mirror. The astronauts also installed a co-processor that improved the memory and speed of the onboard computer. During this EVA, Tom Akers achieved a new cumulative record for an American astronaut

on EVA (29 hours 39 minutes), surpassing the 20-year-old record set by Gene Cernan on Apollo 17 at 24 hours 14 minutes. Kathy Thornton became the record-holder for female EVA astronauts at 21 hours 10 minutes. Both had performed EVAs on STS-49 in 1992. During the final EVA (7 hours 21 minutes on 9 Dec, the third by Hoffman and Musgrave), the astronauts replaced the Solar Array Drive Electronics (SADE) unit, as well as installing the Goddard High Resolution Spectrograph Redundancy (GHRS) equipment and placing two protective covers over the original magnetometer.

During FD 8, prior to the final EVA, the Shuttle’s orbit was boosted to 595 km. At this height, the telescope would be released on FD 9, after deployment of the twin boom antennas, unfurling of solar arrays and checking of onboard systems. The redeployment was delayed several hours when ground controllers had to troubleshoot erratic telemetric data from the telescope’s systems monitor. This had occurred before and was not connected to the recent servicing by the astronauts. The mission ended one orbit earlier than planned to allow the crew two landing opportunities at KSC.

Milestones

165th manned space flight

89th US manned space flight

59th Shuttle mission

5th flight of Endeavour

1st Hubble servicing mission

29th US and 53rd flight with EVA operations

1st flight of ESA astronaut as MS2

US astronaut cumulative EVA record – Akers

World female cumulative EVA record – Thornton

1996-001A 11 January 1996

Pad 39B, Kennedy Space Center, Florida 20 January 1996

Runway 15, Shuttle Landing Facility, KSC, Florida OV-105 Endeavour/ET-75/SRB BI-077/SSME #1 2028; #2 2039; #3 2036 8 days 22 hrs 1 min 47 sec Endeavour

Retrieval of Japanese Space Flyer Unit; deployment and retrieval of OAST-Flyer; EDFT-03

Flight Crew

DUFFY, Brian, 42, USAF, commander, 3rd mission Previous missions: STS-45 (1992); STS-57 (1993)

JETT Jr., Brent Ward, 37, USN, pilot

CHIAO, Leroy, 35, civilian, mission specialist 1, 2nd mission

Previous mission: STS-65 (1994)

SCOTT, Winston Elliott, 45, USN, mission specialist 2 WAKATA, Koichi, 32, civilian, Japanese mission specialist 3 BARRY, Daniel Thomas, 42, civilian, mission specialist 4

Flight Log

The launch of STS-72 was delayed for 23 minutes due both to problems with ground sites and the need to avoid a potential collision with an item of space debris. On FD 3, Japanese MS Wakata used the RMS to grasp the Japanese Space Flyer Unit (SFU), which had originally been launched in March 1995 aboard an H-2 rocket from the Tanegashima Space Centre in Japan. Over a ten-month period, more than a dozen onboard instruments and experiments had been operating in a research programme that encompassed materials and biological science. Prior to grappling the unit with the RMS, the twin solar arrays had to be jettisoned after it was found that they were not correctly retracted.

The next day, the Office of Aeronautics and Space Technology Flyer (OAST – Flyer) was deployed, again by Wakata using the RMS, on an independent two-day flight that extended to approximately 72 km from Endeavour. Attached to the SPARTAN platform were four experiments that investigated spacecraft contamina­tion, global positioning technology, laser ordnance devices and an amateur radio package. The flyer was retrieved on FD 6. In addition to the deployment and retrieval operations, the crew had a programme of payload bay and mid-deck secondary

experiments to conduct, which mainly consisted of studies in ozone concentrations in the atmosphere, a laser to accurately measure the distance between the Earth’s surface and the orbiter, and a range of biological and biomedical experiments.

The crew also completed two EVAs as part of the EDFT programme of prep­aration for extensive EVA activities during ISS construction. During the first EVA (15 Jan, 6 hours 9 minutes), astronauts Chiao (EV1) and Barry (EV2) evaluated a new portable work platform and the Rigid Umbilical Structure, which was being devel­oped as a possible retention device for ISS fluid and electrical lines. During the second EVA (17 Jan, 6 hours 54 minutes), this time conducted by Chiao and Scott (EV3), the portable work platform was again evaluated and the astronauts also tested the design of a utility box, another item under development for ISS, which would hold avionics and fluid line connections. During the EVA, Scott tested his suit in severe cold temperatures of up to —75°C, to find out whether the revised design would keep him warm during the test. In fact, the 35-minute test resulted in temperatures of — 122°C being recorded, providing a tough test of the suit’s extremities (fingers and feet) and coolant loop bypass system. Scott reported that he was aware of the low temperatures but remained comfortable and though had he been working rather than staying still, he determined that he would have felt warmer in either situation.

Milestones

185th manned space flight

104th US manned space flight

74th Shuttle mission

10th flight of Endeavour

33rd US and 60th flight with EVA operations

3rd EDFT exercise

Flight Crew

PADALKA, Gennady Ivanovich, 40, Russian Air Force, commander AVDEYEV, Sergei Vasilyevich, 42, civilian, flight engineer, 3rd mission Previous missions: Soyuz TM15 (1992); Soyuz TM22 (1996)

BATURIN, Yuri Mikhailovich, 49, Russian Air Force, cosmonaut researcher

Flight Log

Before becoming a cosmonaut, Yuri Baturin had been a space physicist. He then became the national security advisor for President Boris Yeltsin and then the Defence Council Secretary. He was also an advisor on space matters and was attached to the 1997 Air Force cosmonaut selection (with the rank of colonel). In April 1998, he completed a 12-day mission to Mir, returning with the EO-25 crew. After his mission he stated that, in his opinion, the Mir complex should be kept operating for at least two years beyond the planned 1999 decommission date.

When Baturin and the E0-25 crew departed Mir, the two remaining cosmonauts pursued their EO-26 programme. This included an internal EVA inside the forward node to reset electrical connectors inside the Spektr module. Their subsequent 10 November EVA (5 hours 54 minutes) featured the deployment of Japanese and French experiments. They then continued their programme of experiments, many of which had been left on board the station by international visitors, enhancing the return from the investment in those experiments.

Mir was almost forgotten in the wake of the launch of the first element of ISS – the Zarya module – in November. This was followed by the first Shuttle mission to add other elements – the US node Unity – the following month. With ISS in orbit, Russia indicated that it was looking for private funds to keep Mir aloft into the new

millennium, as governmental support would end in 1999 when its commitment to ISS increased. When news came that the Service Module of the new station (Zvezda) would be delayed into 2000 and with it the capability of supporting a resident crew, the call to maintain Mir operations beyond 1999 intensified. There was also discussion about further commercial ventures for the station, including filming part of a movie aboard Mir with actors making a short visiting mission to film scenes in orbit. With news that a new investor might support further use of Mir, there remained the question of fitting in the two missions already planned as the EO-26 residence drew to a close and Mir funding from the government ended. The two options were to either fly a Russian commander with the French flight engineer to see out the planned programme, or to leave Avdeyev aboard Mir to join the Russian and French crew members, making a three-person crew for the remainder of the government-funded occupation of the station. The subsequent Slovak mission could then be launched with the new crew and return with Padalka on TM28.

In the new year, the cosmonauts continued their science programme as news came in that the life of the station was to be extended three years (to 2002), if sufficient non­budgetary (government) funds could be found. This allowed Energiya to tentatively plan a programme through to 2001. Just weeks later, the news came that the “private investor” had pulled out. The EO-27 crew launched in February 1999 were expecting to be the last crew to man the station.

Milestones

208th manned space flight 87th Russian manned space flight 80th manned Soyuz mission 27th manned Soyuz TM mission 26th Mir resident crew

33rd Russian and 71st flight with EVA operations

Avdeyev celebrates his 43rd birthday (1 Jan) on Mir – the third birthday he has spent in space (previously 1993 and 1996)

Flight Crew

BROWN Jr., Curtis Lee, 46, USAF, commander, 5th mission Previous missions: STS-47 (1992); STS-66 (1994); STS-77 (1996); STS-85 (1997) LINDSEY, Steven Wayne, 38, USAF, pilot, 2nd mission Previous mission: STS-87 (1997)

ROBINSON, Stephen Kern, 43, civilian, mission specialist 1, 2nd mission Previous mission: STS-85 (1997)

PARAZYNSKI, Scott Edward, 37, civilian, mission specialist 2, 3rd mission Previous missions: STS-66 (1994); STS-86 (1997)

DUQUE, Pedro Francisco, 35, civilian, mission specialist 3 MUKAI, Chiaki, 46, civilian, payload specialist 1, 2nd mission Previous mission: STS-65 (1994)

GLENN Jr., John Herschel, 77, US Senator, payload specialist 2, 2nd mission Previous mission: Mercury 6 (1962)

Flight Log

John Glenn, the first American astronaut to orbit the Earth in 1962, had always wanted to return to space. But he had not expected that it would take over 36 years for him to do so. While pursing a business and political career, Glenn had always maintained a close relationship with NASA and had convinced NASA administrators that a set of medical experiments looking at the effects of microgravity on an older person would be of benefit to the near – and long-term goals of the agency. It would also provide an interesting set of comparison data with that taken during his first flight in 1962. Glenn first approached NASA with the idea in 1996, but it took two years to develop the experiment programme and obtain formal authorisation. The flight was also a public relations triumph for the space agency and a swansong of Glenn’s career in public life.

US Senator and former Mercury astronaut John H. Glenn Jr., equipped with sleep-monitoring equipment, floats near his sleep station on the mid-deck of Discovery

The launch progressed smoothly, with only minimal delays caused by a master alarm in the cabin and an aircraft infringement in the restricted airspace around KSC. After the ignition of the three main engines and prior to SRB ignition, the drag chute compartment door fell off, but this never posed a problem for the mission. It was decided that the drag chute would not be deployed during landing rollout.

The primary objective of the flight was a suite of over 80 experiments in the SpaceHab module. These focused on medical and materials research and a series of life sciences investigations that were sponsored by NASA and the space agencies of Canada, Europe and Japan (hence the inclusion of Duque and Mukai on the crew). The latter included cardiovascular studies, sleep studies and blood research. The investigations conducted by and on John Glenn provided useful data that would help to understand the process of aging in humans. The aging process and long space flights have similar common physiological effects and it was felt that information from Glenn and the other astronauts would help not only with long-duration space flight countermeasures, but also to identify early signs of aging and deterioration, which would assist in understanding the process and help in the development of counter­measures for the aging process on Earth. Like all former NASA astronauts, Glenn had been undertaking regular annual physicals at JSC since leaving the programme. These examinations have built up into an impressive database of biomedical studies of space explorers to see what changes, if any, occur as a result of space flight. Glenn’s flight at the age of 77, some 36 years after his first flight, was a unique opportunity to expand this data base. His experiments focused on how the absence of gravity affects balance and perception, the immune system response, bone and muscle density, metabolism and blood flow, and sleep.

The flight also included a range of studies on fish and plant specimens and a programme of microgravity materials studies in agriculture, medicine and manufac­turing. During the mission, the crew also released a Petite Amateur Naval Satellite (PANSAT), which tested innovative technologies to capture and transmit radio signals normally lost because the original signal was too weak. The Hubble Space Telescope Orbital System Test provided an on-orbit test bed for hardware that would be used during the third Hubble service mission in 1999. The SPARTAN 201 free-flyer was released between FD 4 and 6, carrying a set of re-flight experiments from the 1997 STS-87 mission, with instruments to study the solar corona and gather data on the solar wind. Also located in the payload bay was a Hitchhiker Support Structure (HSS) with six experiments which had solar, terrestrial and astronomical objectives, to obtain data on extreme UV radiation on the sun and atmosphere. A UV spectrograph telescope was included to obtain information on extended plasma sources, such as hot stars and the planet Jupiter.

There were concerns over Glenn’s health on both his missions, the first because he was venturing into the unknown and the second over his age. But he had maintained a fine physical condition throughout his life. Upon entering space in 1962, Glenn commented: “Zero-G and I feel fine,’’ and 36 years later he said that he still felt the same way. When he returned to Earth at the end of STS-95, his comment was: “One-G and I feel fine.’’

Milestones

209th manned space flight

122nd US manned space flight

92nd Shuttle flight

25th flight of Discovery

12th SpaceHab mission (7th single module)

1st flight of SSME Block II engines

Glenn becomes oldest person to fly in space, aged 77

Flight Crew

ONUFRIYENKO, Yuri Ivanovich, 40, Russian Air Force, ISS-4 and Soyuz TM commander, 2nd mission Previous mission: Soyuz TM23 (1996)

BURSCH, Daniel Wheeler, 44, USN, ISS-4 flight engineer 1, 4th mission Previous missions: STS-51 (1993); STS-68 (1994); STS-77 (1996)

WALZ, Carl Erwin, 46, USAF, ISS-4 flight engineer 2, 4th mission Previous missions: STS-51 (1993); STS-65 (1994); STS-79 (1996)

Flight Log

The fourth expedition featured an experiment programme of 26 US and 28 Russian experiments in the fields of bioastronautics research, physical sciences, space product development, fundamental space biology, Earth observations, education and tech­nology. Many of these experiments were carried over from previous expeditions.

During their stay aboard the station, the crew performed three EVAs. The first two (14 Jan for 6 hours 3 minutes and 25 Jan for 5 hours 59 minutes) were conducted from the Pirs facility on the Russian segment. The final one (20 Feb for 5 hours 47 minutes) was conducted out of the Quest airlock on the American segment. During the first EVA, Onufriyenko and Walz relocated the cargo boom for the Strela crane from PMA-1 to the outside of Pirs. An amateur radio antenna was also installed on Zvezda. EVA-2 saw Onufriyenko and Bursch install six deflector shields on the Service Module thrusters, install a further antenna and retrieve various science packages from Zvezda. The final EVA was conducted by the two American members of the ISS-4 crew on the 40th anniversary of the first flight of John Glenn, the first American to orbit the Earth. Walz and Bursch performed the EVA from the Quest airlock, the first without a docked Shuttle in support. The objective was to prepare the area for installation of the S0 Truss during STS-110 in April 2002, relocating the tools to be used and inspecting the exterior of the station.

During the mission, the crew would oversee the upgrading of software as well as receiving the Progress Ml-8 re-supply craft. Their visitors arrived on the STS-110 mission that delivered the S0 Truss assembly and on the Soyuz TM33 Taxi mission. Prior to the arrival of Soyuz TM34, the crew had to relocate TM33 from the nadir port of Zarya to redock with the Pirs docking port.

The crew experienced several power problems and a number of failures of the Elektron oxygen generator. To conserve oxygen reserves in the tanks of Quest, the crew resorted to burning solid fuel oxygen generators in the Zvezda module while they attempted repairs to Elektron. This took several days during May. They also experi­enced difficulties with the operation of the Canadarm2, including the failure of the wrist roll joint, which would require replacement.

They were relieved on the station in June by the ISS-5, who arrived on STS-111, the mission that would take the ISS-4 crew back to Earth. Both the Americans in the ISS-4 crew surpassed Shannon Lucid’s previous US space flight endurance record (188 days), eventually clocking 196 days. In their careers, both men had flown four times and by the end of their ISS mission, Walz had logged 231 days in space while Bursch had accumulated 227 days. Onufriyenko had also completed two long missions and brought his experience to 389 days by the end of this one.

Milestones

4th ISS resident crew

3rd ISS EO crew to be launched by Shuttle

1st EVA from Quest without a Shuttle docked to the station

Flight Crew

LINDSEY, Steven Wayne, 45, USAF, commander, 4th mission Previous missions: STS-87 (1997); STS-98 (1998); STS-104 (2001)

KELLY, Mark Edward, 42, USN, pilot, 2nd mission Previous mission: STS-108 (2001)

FOSSUM, Michael Edward, 48, civilian, mission specialist 1 NOWAK, Lisa Marie, 43, USN, mission specialist 2 WILSON, Stephanie Diana, 39, civilian, mission specialist 3 SELLERS, Piers John, 51, civilian, mission specialist 4, 2nd mission Previous mission: STS-112 (2002)

ISS-13 crewmember up only:

REITER, Thomas, 48, German Air Force, ESA mission specialist 5, ISS-13 flight engineer 2, 2nd mission Previous mission: Soyuz TM22 (1995)

Flight Log

Bad weather again delayed the launch of the Shuttle on 1 and 2 July, but after a one – day stand down, the launch resumed and STS-121 lifted off on America’s 230th birthday, the first launch on Independence Day, Again the launch phase was dram­atically caught on film and analysed for any serious debris impacts, Though some debris hits were noted, there were no serious impacts, Following the docking on 6 July, the crew relocated the Leonardo MPLM to the station, where 3,357 kg of logistics was transferred. This included a new heat exchanger, a new window and window seals for the Microgravity Science Glove Box, a US EMU suit, SAFER jet pack and personal items, and a new oxygen generator to be installed in Destiny, There was also a

European Minus Eighty Degree Laboratory Freezer for storage of experiment sam­ples prior to return to Earth. The MPLM was relocated back in the payload bay of Discovery on 14 July, by which time it had been filled with 2,086 kg of experiment samples, broken equipment and trash.

Three EVAs by Sellers (EV1) and Fossum (EV2) were completed during the docked phase of the flight. EVA 1 (8 Jul for 7 hours 31 minutes) included fitting a protection device for power, data and video cables on the S0 Truss. By routing cables through the Interface Umbilical Assembly, they could move the MT railcar to replace the trailing umbilical system with its power and data cable that had been inadvertently severed late in 2005. The astronauts then evaluated the RMS with the Orbiter Boom Sensor System, for potential use as a work platform during EVA to repair the damaged orbiter if required. EVA 2 (10 Jul for 6 hours 47 minutes) saw the crew restore the MT to full operation, while EVA 3 (12 Jul for 7 hours 11 minutes) focused on testing repairs on the Thermal Protection System Reinforced Carbon-Carbon panels, part of the evaluation of repair techniques that may be available to effect orbital repairs on future Shuttle missions. Photography of the samples (together with that of an area of Discovery’s port wing) was conducted. These images would be returned to Earth for detailed analysis. The astronauts also relocated a fixed grapple bar on the integrated cargo carrier in the payload bay to a position on the ammonia tank inside the SI Truss assembly, so that it could be moved by a future EVA crew at a later date.

Thomas Reiter had formerly exchanged to the ISS-13 crew shortly after the hatches between the vehicles had opened, moving his Soyuz seat liner into the DM of Soyuz TMA8. The more formal farewells occurred shortly prior to closure of the hatches and undocking of the Shuttle on 15 July. The two spacecraft had been docked for over 9 days, a day longer than planned as the mission was extended by a day to accommodate the third EVA. A final check of the surfaces of Discovery revealed nothing of concern and the safe re-entry and landing two days later gave an added boost to mission planners, eager to resume station construction with the next Shuttle mission.

Milestones

248th manned space flight 145th US manned space flight 115th Shuttle mission 32nd flight of Discovery 18th Shuttle ISS flight

58th US and 97th flight with EVA operations

6th Discovery ISS mission

7th MPLM flight

4th flight of MPLM-1 Leonardo

1st US launch on 4 July

Flight Crew

YOUNG, John Watts, 50, USN, commander, 5th mission

Previous missions: Gemini 3 (1965); Gemini 10 (1966); Apollo 10 (1969);

Apollo 16 (1972)

CRIPPEN, Robert Laurel, 43, USN, pilot

Flight Log

The build up to this momentous space mission for the US programme was painfully slow. A budget lower than that afforded to Apollo for a space system five times more technically demanding resulted in inevitable glitches at almost every turn. The first space flight by the Space Shuttle was originally scheduled for 1978, but in fact all that happened was that the first four space crews were rather optimistically named for missions that would start the following year. Thus, veteran John Young and rookie Bob “Crip” Crippen began what was to become one of the longest periods of training ever, ending with a lift-off in 1981. Coincidentally, for such a major space milestone, the launch would be on the twentieth anniversary of the first manned space flight by Yuri Gagarin.

That the launch had been scrubbed at T — 36 min, by a computer synchronisation glitch two days before, which had been dubbed by the media assembled at the Kennedy Space Center as a “fiasco”, is indicative of the reputation of the Shuttle. The USA had been through a period of several major technical disasters, including Three Mile Island, and there were many cynics expecting to be reporting another from the Kennedy Space Center on a maiden flight being manned for the first time. There is no doubting the heroism of the crew, who had only the dubious opportunity of ejection seats available to them for an early bail-out.

The cataclysmic blast-off occurred at 07: 00 hrs local time, causing unpredicted over pressurisation of the orbiter and a potential collision with the launch tower, followed almost immediately by the roll programme which alarmed already nervous

The Third Decade: 1981-1990

spectators with its brute force. Thrust was five per cent higher than anticipated, leading to a steeper, “heads down” climb to orbit. The solid rocket boosters were ejected at T + 2 minutes 11 seconds and the three main engines cut off at T + 8 minutes. The Space Shuttle Columbia was in initial orbit and was then boosted by four burns of the orbiter’s own propulsion system. Inclination was 40.3° and maximum altitude 232 km (144 miles).

With Columbia flying “upside-down” with its back facing the Earth, the payload bay doors were opened, exposing a vast interior which was empty for this test flight. TV cameras also showed that some heatshield tiles were missing from the rear of the orbiter and much was made of this in the popular press. They were not critical tiles, but all the same if they were missing, could other more critical tiles on the orbiter’s underside be loose or lost? The crew would find out after their thirty-sixth orbit, when after an almost flawless orbital workout by the jubilant Young and Crippen, the OMS engines initiated the 2 minute 27 second long retro-fire burn.

The Mach 25 re-entry, during which some tiles were exposed to 1,260°C, was accompanied by the usual radio blackout. Then, at Mach 10 and 57.3 km (36 miles), the happy Young reported that all was well. He proceeded to bring Columbia in like an airliner, landing on the dry lake bed runway 23, at Edwards Air Force Base, with main gear touchdown at T + 2 days 6 hours 20 minutes 32 seconds. Routine space flight with airliner-like landings seemed to have begun. Fifty Shuttle flights a year were being predicted.

Milestones

80th manned space flight 32nd US manned space flight 1st Shuttle mission 1st flight of Columbia

1st manned space flight in a reusable spacecraft

1st manned space flight on previously untested spacecraft

1st manned space flight to be boosted by solid propellants

1st flight by crewman on fifth space mission

1st flight to end with conventional runway landing

Flight Crew

POPOV, Leonid Ivanovich, 35, Soviet Air Force, commander, 2nd mission Previous mission: Soyuz 35 (1980)

PRUNARIU, Dumitru Dorin, 28, Romanian Army Air Force, cosmonaut researcher

Flight Log

The final Interkosmos mission involving a cosmonaut researcher from a Soviet bloc country, Soyuz 40, was also the last of this Soyuz model. Crewed by Leonid Popov and Dumitru Prunariu, the mission got under way at 23: 17hrs from Baikonur, followed by the docking with Salyut 6 a day later and greetings from residents Kovalenok and Savinykh. Experiments on board included those to study the Earth’s upper atmosphere and changes in its magnetic field. The mission ended at T + 7 days 20 hours 41 minutes 52 seconds, 224 km (139 miles) southeast of Dzhezkazgan. Maximum altitude during the 51.6° mission was 374 km (232 miles).

When Soyuz T4 returned later, Salyut 6 had received 16 cosmonaut crews and 15 unmanned spacecraft in three-and-a-half years. No fewer than 35 dockings had been made with it and Salyut 6 was occupied for 676 days. Some 13,000 photographs of the Earth had been taken and 1,310 experiments operated a remarkable record.

Milestones

81st manned space flight

49th Soviet manned space flight

42nd Soyuz manned space flight

39th (original) Soyuz manned space flight

Final flight of original Soyuz variant

1st manned space flight by a Romanian

9th and final Interkosmos mission

Prunariu (right) wears the Chibis lower body negative pressure garment aboard Salyut 6, assisted by Popov

Flight Crew

OVERMYER, Robert Franklyn, 48, USMC, commander, 2nd mission Previous mission: STS-5 (1982)

GREGORY, Frederick Drew, 44, USAF, pilot LIND, Don Leslie, 54, civilian, mission specialist 1 THAGARD, Norman Earl, 41, civilian, mission specialist 2 THORNTON, William Edgar, 56, civilian, mission specialist 3 WANG, Taylor G., 44, civilian, payload specialist 1 VAN DEN BERG, Lodewijk, 53, civilian, payload specialist 2

Flight Log

Space Shuttle activities were building up to a frenetic pace by April 1985. Discovery was dispatched on mission 51-D, Challenger rolled out to the now vacant Pad 39A for 51-B, and the new orbiter Atlantis arrived at the KSC in preparation for its first mission later that year. It was all looking rather routine stuff, especially when 51-B finally got off the ground – 17 days after 51-D – with a seven-man crew that included three people over 50, as if to emphasise the apparent routine nature of manned space flight. NASA was pushing the system and time was running out. Spacelab 2 featured the Instrument Pointing System and a pallet-only development flight. It was delayed so much due to preparing the IPS that Spacelab 3 flew before it, adding to the confusing Shuttle identification sequence. Research on Spacelab 3, considered to be the first operational mission of the long series, focused on five disciplines: materials science, life sciences, fluid mechanics, atmospheric physics and astronomy. The flight featured 15 primary experiments, of which 14 were considered successful. The crew worked in two shifts: Gold (Gregory, Thagard, Van Den Berg) and Silver (Overmyer, Lind, Thornton, Wang).

Challenger lifted off just 2 minutes 18 seconds later than anticipated, after a liquid oxygen drain back had to be manually commanded, at 12: 02hrs local time.

Apart from an overheating APU which had to be shut down, the launch was smooth and Challenger, in its 57° orbit which would reach a maximum altitude of 308 km (191 miles), was placed into a tail down, nose up gravity gradient attitude, vital for the array of mainly microgravity processing experiments to be operated inside the Space – lab 3 laboratory. The two payload specialists. Lodewijk van den Berg and Taylor Wang, both naturalised American citizens, operated their own crystal growth and fluid physics experiments, the latter only after spending days getting it to work following an electrical fault that almost spoiled years of hard work.

Also on board Challenger – another Shuttle first – were two monkeys and 24 rats, to help with the study of space adaptation syndrome, SAS, under the guidance of doctors Norman Thagard and William Thornton. The performance of the Animal Holding Facility left much to be desired and the astronauts spent a lot of time clearing up floating droppings. Two small research satellites were to be deployed from GAS canisters in the payload bay, but one failed to get away. Science astronaut Don Lind, having waited a record 19 years to get into space, marvelled at the sight of the aurora borealis from space.

The highly esoteric science mission, which went over most people’s heads, was extremely successful and ended with a long rollout on the Edwards Air Force Base desert runway 17, and with the heaviest cargo to return from space – 14,198 kg (31,307 lb) – at T + 7 days 0 hours 8 minutes 46 seconds. Further landings at the KSC had been banned after the 51-D landing incident.

Milestones

105th manned space flight 48th US manned space flight 17th Shuttle flight 7th flight of Challenger

Thornton retains oldest person in space record (56) 2nd Spacelab Long Module mission