Soyuz Lands Wednesday With Crew

Space Shuttle Atlantis has arrived at Launch Pad 39A at Kennedy Space Center, Fla., poised for a May 12 liftoff on the STS-125 Mission to repair and refurbish the Hubble Space Telescope.

Meanwhile, a Russian Soyuz vehicle is set to land a crew back on Earth Wednesday, bringing the crew members back from the International Space Station.

The Hubble has taken stunning pictures of the universe, increasing knowledge of its origin and composition.

That Atlantis mission was to have occurred last year, but was postponed when the Hubble developed problems and a decision was made to carry new components to the eye in the sky.

In a special development, the mission will provide a chance to see two space shuttles on launch pads simultaneously.

Because Atlantis isn’t going to the space station, where crews can take shelter if a shuttle develops a problem, the Hubble offers no such life raft aid, so a backup shuttle must remain poised to fly to Atlantis if it encounters a problem.

Space shuttle Endeavour is scheduled to roll out to Kennedy’s other launch pad, 39B, on Thursday, April 17. Endeavour will be prepared for liftoff in the unlikely event that a rescue mission is necessary following Atlantis’ launch. After Atlantis is cleared to land, Endeavour will move to Launch Pad 39A for its upcoming STS-127 mission to the space station, targeted to launch in mid-June. (Please see launch schedule in this issue.)

Endeavour will roll over from Kennedy’s Orbiter Processing Facility 2 to the Vehicle Assembly Building on Friday. In the assembly building, crews will attach the spacecraft to its external fuel tank and twin solid rocket boosters in preparations for its move to pad 39B.

NASA managers decided to proceed with the dual-pad approach after carefully reviewing the manifest options to complete the space station and to ensure it is in the most robust condition possible following shuttle retirement.

The dual-pad approach requires one month less processing time than the single-pad approach and will help complete both STS-125 and STS-127. Endeavour will deliver the Japanese Exposed Facility and make the space station more robust to support cargo delivery for a six-person crew.

Atlantis’ 11-day mission is the final shuttle flight to Hubble. During five spacewalks, the shuttle’s seven astronauts will install two new instruments, repair two inactive ones and replace other Hubble components.

The Science Instrument Command and Data Handling Unit that will be installed in the telescope arrived at Kennedy. The new unit will replace the one in Hubble that stopped working in September and delayed the servicing mission.

The result of the upgrades will be six working, complementary science instruments with capabilities beyond those now available and an extended operational lifespan of the telescope through at least 2014.

Scott Altman will command Atlantis. Gregory C. Johnson will be the pilot. Mission Specialists will be John Grunsfeld, Mike Massimino, Megan McArthur, Andrew Feustel and Michael Good.

STS-125 is the 126th shuttle flight, the 30th flight for Atlantis and the fifth Hubble servicing mission.

The shuttle program will continue to work with the Constellation Program to minimize the impact on the Ares I-X test flight which will use Launch Pad 39B later this year.

Meanwhile, in the imminent Soyuz landing, space station Expedition 18 Commander Mike Fincke and Flight Engineer Yury Lonchakov continued preparations for their return to Earth. Among those activities were physical exercise and the transfer to their Soyuz TMA-13 spacecraft of experiments and other items slated for return to Earth.

Fincke and Lonchakov are targeted to return to Earth on April 8. Joining them aboard their Soyuz spacecraft will be Charles Simonyi, a space tourist who arrived at the station with Expedition 19 for a two-week stay. He is the first space tourist to make two trips to the station. Staying aboard the station are Expedition 19 Commander Gennady Padalka and flight engineers Koichi Wakata and Michael Barratt.

Padalka spent time on the Russian experiment IZGIB, a name which means "bend." The experiment’s objective is to help update mathematical models of the station’s gravitation environment.

Barratt worked with the Bodies In the Space Environment experiment, which studies how humans first adapt to microgravity and then re-adapt to normal gravity conditions upon return to Earth. This experiment involves comparisons of preflight, flight and postflight perceptions and mental imagery.

As part of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s Education Payload Observation, Wakata set up the work area for Hiten, an observation in which crew members will be recorded performing ancient east Asian dances in microgravity.