Shuttle Discovery Launch Weblog by Dr. Michael Freeman

shuttle_sidebarLate yesterday evening, the Shuttle managers announced that it appeared that a small piece of foam had struck Discovery’s heat shield on ascent from the launch pad. Vegas and the rest of the STS-114 crew conducted more inspections of the Orbiter’s heat shield today. They again used the Orbiter Boom Sensor System attached to the Shuttle’s robot arm to take a closer look at areas of interest. Jim had a major role in that activity.

The really welcome good news is that based on analysis so far, it appears Discovery has not sustained any damage that would prevent a safe return to Earth on Aug. 7. Also early indications are that Discovery has less damage than Shuttles on previous flights.

As many of you likely know, Discovery carried up supplies for the ISS in the Raffaello Multi-Purpose Logistics Module and today the crew began offloading that cargo into the ISS. Raffaello will also be used to carry ISS garbage back to Earth on the return flight on the 7th of August, so it gets used coming and going.

I know that the crew also spent time today preparing for the first of the three spacewalks that are scheduled for this mission. It’s scheduled to begin before 4:00 am CDT Saturday morning and will last about six and a half hours. These are always great to watch!

I learned this morning that Vegas has been notified of his recent promotion to USAF Colonel (from Lt. Colonel), and in his honor the crew was awakened last night with the song “Vertigo” by U2, very appropriate for a fighter pilot!

By the way, NASA is standing firm that the Shuttle fleet is not grounded, in spite of headlines in all the newspapers. It is true that they won’t launch the next mission until they better understand and correct the ET foam-shedding problem. They are not yet able to say how long that will be.

On a personal note, I am returning to Tuscaloosa this evening. I will be departing my office here in the Headquarters building at KSC in about an hour and a half for my flight to first New Orleans and then on to Birmingham, scheduled to arrive there at 8:20 pm. It will be good to get home to Nancy and our six cats and two dogs. Been away long enough.

I will continue this blog as long as the mission lasts…

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EDITOR’S NOTE: Dr. Michael Freeman is an Associate Professor of aerospace engineering and mechanics at The University of Alabama. He is attending this week’s launch of the space shuttle Discovery, and will publish daily accounts of the events surrounding the shuttle’s “return to flight” launch. UA graduate James Kelly is the pilot of STS-114, NASA’s first space flight in over two years. Dr. Freeman may be reached by e-mail at michael.freeman@ua.edu.