KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla., Nov. 25 (UPI) -- Three years after the first space station modules were launched into orbit, NASA is on schedule for the first mission dedicated to making use of the budding science laboratory in orbit.
Shuttle Endeavour is scheduled to lift off at 7:41 p.m. EST Thursday for a week-long stay at the orbital complex. Endeavour commander Dominic Gorie and the shuttle astronauts, as well as the replacement three-man station crew, led by cosmonaut Yuri Onufrienko, arrived at the Florida spaceport Sunday afternoon for final flight preparations.
In addition to ferrying the replacement crew to live aboard and operate the station, Endeavour is loaded with science experiments and supplies for the outpost.
"This flight is a cornerstone flight that marks the transition from the initial building of the space station to its fully functioning role as an orbital laboratory," said Gorie, who will be making his third trip into space. "We are at the turning point, where not only are we doing a crew transfer, but we're bringing up science and payloads and bringing down science and payloads that are in work on the station."
The three-man, one-woman shuttle-based team will not only bear the brunt of transferring hundreds of items into the space station, but also packing their detachable orbital U-Haul -- as well as the shuttle itself -- with completed experiments, unneeded equipment, and other gear that needs a ride back to Earth.
Their most precious cargo: the three men returning from space after a 4 1/2-month mission.
Shuttle crewmembers Linda Godwin and Dan Tani plan to stage a single spacewalk during their stay at the station to try to correct a problem with the outpost's power-producing solar arrays. Additional spacewalks by the new station-based crew will be conducted in the weeks after the shuttle's departure.
NASA plans to begin the three-day launch countdown Monday evening. Also Monday, a Russian cargo ship is scheduled to blast off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan loaded with additional supplies for the incoming station crew.
The shuttle launch will be the first for NASA since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and subsequent tightening of security measures. The agency had at one point considered classifying the exact time of liftoff until minutes before launch and imposing a news blackout on major milestones of the flight.
After extensive debate, officials decided those steps would be "inappropriate and ineffective" said flight director Wayne Hale, adding that additional reviews are "going forward to see what steps we might do in the future."
Said Hale, "The space shuttle is a highly visible national symbol and it is a large commitment by the American taxpayers, a large investment, so we would be remiss if we didn't take steps to protect that asset, those investments, that symbol and the people who work there."
