NASA has given the green light for the space shuttle Endeavor to launch early next month.
Endeavour will blast off on February 8th on a mission to the International Space Station. The launch will be the last nighttime shuttle launch before the venerable fleet is retired.
Endeavour will depart Kennedy Space Center’s launch pad 39A at 04:39 EST (09:39 GMT) carrying the US’s Tranquility node and seven-windowed cupola (seen below being mated with Tranquility). On board will be commander George Zamka, pilot Terry Virts and mission specialists Robert Behnken, Kathryn Hire, Nicholas Patrick and Stephen Robinson.
“We reviewed all aspects of the shuttle and the space station,” Bill Gerstenmaier, chief of space flight operations, said after an executive-level flight readiness review. “It was an extremely thorough review. We set the launch date for February 7 at 4:39 and so far, things look pretty good.”
Launch Director Mike Leinbach said Endeavour’s processing was going smoothly and “we’re in outstanding shape.”
“We’re not looking at any problems,” he told reporters. “We have a good, low constraints count now in the firing room, so really in great shape there.”
Assuming an on-time launch, commander George Zamka, pilot Terry Virts, Kathryn Hire, flight engineer Stephen Robinson, and spacewalkers Robert Behnken and Nicholas Patrick plan to dock with the International Space Station two days later, at around 1:23 a.m. February 9.
The primary goal of the flight is to attach the new Tranquility module, or node 3, to the left side of the lab complex to house life support gear, exercise equipment and a robotics work station. Three spacewalks by Behnken and Patrick are planned before undocking February 17 and landing back at the Kennedy Space Center around 11:16 p.m. on February 19.
“We’re embarking on probably the last of the assembly flights to install a complicated module on the ISS,” said station Program Manager Mike Suffredini. “There are still other assembly flights ahead of us, but node 3 is probably the last of the very complicated modules that’ll have its own cooling system and be the home of all the regenerative (environmental control and life support) systems as well as some other critical systems that support the crew on orbit.”
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