ESA MOVES AHEAD

At this time ESA awarded a 03.7 million contract to the German DLR Space Centre to establish the Columbus Control Centre at the German Space Operations Centre, in Oberpfaffenhofen. The new centre would also control Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) operations when they commenced. In the contemporary launch manifest, both the Columbus launch to ISS and the first ATV launch were due to take place in 2004.

Meanwhile, Node-2, the first of two Nodes built by Aleno Spazio in Turin, Italy, had completed its Acceptance Review and was due to be delivered to ESA in mid­May. Due to be launched by Shuttle in 2004, Node-2 would serve as a mounting for Columbus and Kibo. Node-2 would be named “Harmony’’. Following ESA accep­tance testing the Harmony and Columbus modules were to be shipped to KSC in Florida, where they were officially handed over to NASA and placed in line for their respective Shuttle launches.