Update: Mission Going 'Exceedingly Well'

Endeavour's two-day-old mission is going "exceedingly well," a senior shuttle program manager said tonight during a briefing at Johnson Space Center in Houston.

Photo analysis has determined that a strip of insulation thought to have torn away during launch is in fact intact near a rear orbital maneuvering engine on the shuttle's left side.

"We have determined that all of our thermal protection system blankets are intact in that area," said LeRoy Cain, chairman of the Mission Management Team.

Cain said photos likely spotted ice debris, since it was located in an area that gets extremely cold, where liquid hydrogen is pumped through the shuttle into the external tank.

It is the mission's only confirmed report of launch debris thus far, but teams are still analyzing pictures, including those taken today during a back flip maneuver prior to Endeavour's docking with the International Space Station around 5 p.m.

"They have been able to ascertain positively that that piece of debris did not strike the vehicle anywhere, so we don't anticipate any issues with that," Cain said.

"Things are going exceedingly well," Cain concluded. "I'm very pleased with progress that we've had so far."

A decision will be made tomorrow on whether a more in-depth inspection is needed of the tip of Endeavour's right wing.

Access to that area by the shuttle's robotic arm and boom would be blocked once the Italian-made Leonardo cargo module is connected to the station, a process scheduled Monday.

So if an inspection is necessary, it would delay transfer of the packed cargo carrier one day, and extend the current 15-day mission by a day, said lead flight director Mike Sarafin.

"That doesn't present any impact to the mission other than we would use extension day capability to do that," Sarafin said.

Up on the station, Endeavour astronaut Sandra Magnus is scheduled to swap places with Greg Chamitoff as a flight engineer and science officer on Expedition 18. She's expected to spend the next four months on orbit.

Chamitoff, who has spent the past 170 days in space, will ride home on Endeavour, a trip now planned Nov. 29.

Chamitoff was to remove his custom-fitted seat liner from the Soyuz spacecraft docked with the station, which would be used in the event of an emergency escape, to be replaced with Mangus' custom seat liner.

A move of the boom extenstion in the shuttle payload bay was also planned tonight. The station's robotic arm was to grapple the boom and hand it off to shuttle's robotic arm.

The crews also planned to unload some cargo stowed in the shuttle's mid-deck, including spacesuits to be used Tuesday during the first of four planned spacewalks.

Back at Kennedy Space Center, United Space Alliance officials said ships were expected to return Endeavour's solid rocket boosters to Cape Canaveral Air Force Station between 8 a.m. and 10 a.m. Monday.

IMAGE NOTE: Click on an image to enlarge it. Above, the International Space Station's robotic arm prepares to grapple the Orbital Boom Sensor System from Endeavour's payload bay, before handing it off to the shuttle's robotic arm.