Discovery Secured On Launch Platform

Shuttle Discovery this morning is being attached to an external fuel tank, a day after rolling from a Kennedy Space Center processing hangar into the 52-story Vehicle Assembly Building.

In the assembly building's High Bay 3, the tank and twin solid rocket boosters are mounted on a mobile launcher platform that NASA plans to deliver to launch pad 39A on Wednesday, starting at 4 a.m.

It will be the second trip to the pad for the external tank and boosters, which were attached to Atlantis when it rolled out Sept. 4. Atlantis was rolled back Oct. 20 and disconnected from the stack after a technical problem with the Hubble Space Telescope forced the servicing mission's postponement.

The launch of Discovery's 14-day mission to the International Space Station is targeted for Feb. 12.

Overnight, cranes hoisted the 100-ton orbiter from the VAB's transfer aisle over a 16th floor transom and lowered it toward the launcher platform.

Discovery is expected to be "soft" mated with three external tank attachment points by this afternoon. Mechanical and electrical connections will continue to be made and tested before the vehicle is ready to depart the assembly building next week.

The shuttle's payload, a 45-foot truss segment weighing 31,000 pounds, on Wednesday was loaded into a canister for transportation to the launch pad this weekend.

The canister today will be rotated into a vertical position for its ride to the launch complex.

The truss segment is the 11th and last piece of the station's backbone. It carries a final pair of American solar arrays that will boost the outpost's power supply by 25 percent.

IMAGE NOTE: Click on the pictures to enlarge them. Top: the orbiter Discovery on Wednesday rolled out of Orbiter Processing Facility 3 at Kennedy Space Center to head to the Vehicle Assembly Building. Photo credit: NASA/Jim Grossmann. Bottom: In the transfer aisle of the Vehicle Assembly Building on March 17, 2000, the orbiter Atlantis was suspended vertically from an overhead crane before being mated with its external tank and solid rocket boosters for the STS-101 mission. The 122-foot high orbiter is easily accommodated inside the 525-foot-tall, 518-foot-wide VAB.