JOHNSON SPACE CENTER, FL - With commander Chris Ferguson at the controls, the space shuttle Endeavour docked with the International Space Station today as the two vehicles flew 212 miles high over India, beginning eleven days of joint operations that will feature installation of new equipment aboard the station and four spacewalks to clean and repair a faulty solar array joint.
READ: FLIGHT DAY THREE EXECUTE PACKAGE READ: MISSION STATUS UPDATE #4 READ: MISSION STATUS UPDATE #5 READ: NASA TV SCHEDULE IMAGES: STS-126 PHOTO GALLERY VIDEO: ENDEAVOUR DOCKS WITH ISS VIDEO: THE VIEW OF DOCKING FROM ENDEAVOUR VIDEO: DOCKING VIEW FROM ISS VIDEO: FLIGHT DAY THREE HIGHLIGHTS VIDEO: ISS/ENDEAVOUR HATCH OPENING VIDEO: HI-DEF VIDEO OF DOCKING VIDEO: MISSION STATUS BRIEFING VIDEO: ISS ARM HANDS OBSS TO SHUTTLE ARM ALL-ACCESS SUBSCRIBERS: RENDEZVOUS APPROACH (1200 KBPS VIDEO) ALL-ACCESS SUBSCRIBERS: COMPLETE RENDEZVOUS AND DOCKING COVERAGE ALL-ACCESS SUBSCRIBERS: HATCH OPENING (1200 KBPS VIDEO) ALL-ACCESS SUBSCRIBERS: HI-DEF VIDEO OF DOCKING (1200 KBPS VIDEO) The final phase of Endeavour's rendezvous and docking began with the terminal initation burn while the shuttle was 9 miles behind the space station at 2:27 p.m. Over the next three hours, Ferguson and Boe slowly moved Endeavour closer to ISS, stopping at a point 600 feet directly below the Russian Zarya module. Ferguson then executed the now-familiar 360 degree backflip maneuver designed to give Fincke and Chamitoff an opportunity to take high-resolution photographs of the heat shield tiles on its underside using 400 and 800 millimeter telephoto digital cameras. "It looked like it was clean and dry, as we say. It looked really good," Fincke radioed to the ground later. Engineers on the ground will spend the next several days poring over the hundreds of photographs looking for any signs of damage that might have occurred during ascent, although shuttle managers don't expect anything significant to turn up. Shortly after Endeavour lifted off, at about T+30 seconds, some sort of object was spotted falling by the left-hand Orbital Maneuvering System pod. At first, engineers thought it might be a piece of insulation coming off near the area, but onboard video of the rear of Endeavour showed all the insulation is still in place. The current thinking is that it might have been ice, but, in any event, frame-by-frame analysis of video of the launch shows it never made contact with the orbiter. Once the pitch maneuver was complete, Ferguson guided the shuttle up and in front of the station and moved to a pinpoint docking with Pressurized Mating Adapter 2 at the forward end of the complex's Harmony module. Capture and mating took place at 5:01 p.m. "On the big loop, capture confirmed," Endeavour radioed to the space station and mission control in Houston as the capture mechanism engaged to firmly join the spacecraft together. "Endeavour, Houston, on the big loop," capcom Steve Robinson replied from mission control. "The team down here on planet Earth wanted to compliment you on a well-done, very nicely done, rendezvous and docking. It's great to see Endeavour docked with the international space station, and we can also pass that on for all the family ops going on in the viewing room behind us." The next couple hours were spent conducting leak checks and waiting for vibrations to damp out that were induced when Endeavour made contact with the station. Hatch opening was delayed slightly as the astronauts and ground controllers established the communications links between the craft in space and mission control. The hatches between the two vehicles were opened at 7:16 p.m. and Expedition 18 commander Mike Fincke, along with flight engineers Gregory Chamitoff and Yuri Lonchakov, welcomed the seven STS-126 crewmembers aboard. "Endeavour arriving," Chamitoff said, following a naval tradition adopted by the space station by ringing the ship's bell. Ferguson, pilot Eric Boe and mission specialists Don Pettit, Sandra Magnus, Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper, Stephen Bowen and Shane Kimbrough floated into the Harmony to the open arms of their space station counterparts and a brief welcoming ceremony. "Welcome, Endeavour. You guys look awesome. It was a beautiful approach, beautiful docking. We're really glad you're here," Fincke said as he welcomed the Endeavour astronauts aboard. "We understand that this house is in need of an extreme makeover and that you're the crew to do it. We think we've got everything ready for you. We're really glad to see you. Welcome. Welcome, everybody. Welcome to space. "Hey, we figured we'd go for a 10-year anniversary party for the space station, so that's what we showed up for," Ferguson remarked, noting that the tenth anniversary of the start of space station assembly is coming up on Novermber 20. "We're looking forward to working on your house and making it look a little bit better when we're done. You guys are awesome. It's great to see you." After the welcoming ceremony, Fincke took the newly arrived astronauts for a safety briefing and tour of the space station. Today's activities were directed and getting set-up for the rest of the docked mission. The first item of business was to conduct the crew transfer of Chamitoff and Magnus. Chamitoff's custom Soyuz seat liner was removed and replaced in the Soyuz return vehicle with Magnu's own liner. When installation of the liner was complete, Magnus officially joined Expedition 18, becoming flight engineer 2, while Chamitoff joined STS-126. Magnus is beginning a six-month stay aboard ISS. The station-to-shuttle power transfer system, SSPTS, was activated later in the day, allowing Endeavour to draw from the space station for some of its electrical needs and gaining an extra two days of docked time with the outpost. Finally, the station's Canadian-built robot arm was used to grapple the Orbiter Boom Sensor System and hand it off to Endeavour's own robot arm, where it will remain for the rest of the docked mission and will be used after undocking to inspect the shuttle's heat shield before returning to Earth. (Space Media Corporation / SpaceflightNews.new)
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