Discovery pilot George Zamka just reached out with the shuttle's 50-foot robot arm and snatched a 17.5-ton solar array truss, completing the next step in an audacious bid to move the giant girder at the International Space Station.
The orbital hand-off from the station's robot arm took place as joined shuttle Discovery and the outpost flew 220 miles above Earth. Perched atop a high-tech rail cart, the station arm now will roll toward the far left end of the outpost's central truss -- an 80-foot move from one work site to the another.
Crane operators Dan Tani and Clay Anderson then will use it to grab the girder back from the shuttle arm around 9 a.m. EDT today. The plan calls the truss segment to be parked overnight a safe distance from the shuttle-station complex.
Then on Tuesday, with a spacewalking assist from Scott Parazynski and Douglas Wheelock, Stephanie Wilson will try to mount the girder to the portside end of the station's metallic backbone without damaging another nearby set of solar wings.
The move from a base atop the U.S. Unity module, which began with spacewalking prep work last Friday, is considered the toughest construction job astronauts face in the assembly of the international outpost.
The success of the work became even more crucial Sunday after trouble with a giant rotary joint forced station program managers to fix the outpost's starboard solar wings in a stationary position to avoid permanent damage. The details are here: Station power problems
You can follow the unfolding drama live here in The Flame Trench. Simply click the link below the top image to launch our NASA TV viewer and round-the-clock coverage of the agency's 120th shuttle mission.
The timing for all major mission milestones are listed here in the latest version -- Rev E -- of the NASA TV schedule: tvsked_reve.pdf
The astronauts' detailed timeline and messages beamed up from Mission Control are in the Flight Day 7 Execute Package here: FD07exec.pdf
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