Discovery crew caps practice countdown

Discovery's astronauts just finished an emergency escape drill at Kennedy Space Center's launch pad 39A, winding up a two-day practice countdown for their planned Oct. 23 launch on an International Space Station assembly mission.

With countdown clocks ticking and engineers on console in the Launch Control Center, the astronauts donned partial-pressure launch-and-entry suits early today, boarded NASA's silver Astrovan and headed out to the oceanfront launch complex.

Led by veteran astronaut Pam Melroy, the astronauts took an elevator up to the 195-foot level of the launch gantry and crossed a metal catwalk -- a swing arm known as the Orbiter Access Arm -- to a small, enclosed "white room" that serves the same purpose as the boarding ramp of a commercial airliner.

Up on the tower with her were pilot George Zamka and mission specialists Scott Parazynski, Stephanie Wilson, Douglas Wheelock, Dan Tani and Italian astronaut Paolo Nespoli of the European Space Agency.

Dubbed "Pambo" by former shuttle pilot and mission commander Brian Duffy, who flew with her on STS-92 in October 2000, Melroy was wearing a nametag with that nickname. The rest of the crew -- a collection of kidders -- followed suit.

Zamka's nametag read "Zambo." Parazynski -- who is about 6-foot-4-inches tall -- was "Longbow." Wilson, a robot arm operator, was "Robeau" and Wheelock -- a guy who can start a campfire with wet sticks -- was "Flambo." Tani, the second Asian-American to fly aboard the shuttle, was "Bo-Ichi," and Nespoli was just "Rocky," because no one could figure out a good "Bo" name for him.

One by one, the astronauts put on parachute packs stuffed with survival equipment before climbing into the orbiter and strapping into their seats on the flight deck and the middeck.

A close-out crew made up of about a half-dozen specialists helped the astronauts board the vehicle and get situated for the final three hours of the practice countdown, which concluded with a simulated main engine shutdown and launch-pad abort.

The astronauts then did what they would do in a real emergency. They unstrapped, climbed out of the orbiter and scurried in two or three groups, each person with a hand on the shoulder in front of them, to the launch tower escape system.

The astronauts boarded metal frame baskets as if a fire or fuel leak had created a hazardous situation at the pad, but they did not ride them down a 1,200-foot slidewire to a concrete bunker on the western perimeter of the pad area.

The drill capped the crew's Terminal Countdown Demonstration Test, or TCDT, one of the last major training exercises for the astronauts prior to launch. The crew will head back to Houston later today and then return in time for a real three-day launch countdown to begin on Oct. 20.

NASA managers will set a firm launch date next week at the conclusion of a formal Flight Readiness Review, but liftoff now remains targeted for 11:38 a.m. Oct. 23.

IMAGE NOTE: Click to enlarge the NASA photo of the Discovery astronauts walking out of crew quarters before boarding NASA's Astrovan for a ride out to Kennedy Space Center's launch pad 39A. The crew includes (first row, from left) pilot George Zamka and mission commander Pam Melroy, (second row, from left) mission specialists Stephanie Wilson and Douglas Wheelock, (third row) mission specialist Dan Tani and (fourth row, from left) mission specialists Scott Parazynski and Paolo Nespoli. Photo credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett.