Live in Orbit: Happy Hubble Release Day

"Happy Hubble release day!!!"

NASA's Mission Control Center in Houston uploaded that message to the seven-member crew of space shuttle Atlantis this morning in this Flight Day 9 Execute Package.

After the crew concluded a fifth consecutive spacewalk on Monday, it's time to let go of the Hubble Space Telescope and put it back to work.

Mission specialist Megan McArthur will reverse the procedure she executed last Wednesday, when she snared the bus-sized observatory with a 50-foot robotic arm and secured it in the shuttle's payload bay.

She grappled Hubble again at 6:45 a.m., a half-hour later than scheduled, in preparation for its final release into space by astronauts.

With the shuttle fleet slated for retirement next year, no vehicle will be available that can carry the people and equipment needed to service Hubble for a sixth time.

The power the shuttle provided Hubble over the past week has been unplugged.

McArthur guided the robotic arm toward a cross-hair target and grabbed hold of Hubble's pin-like grapple fixture.

"We show a good grapple," mission specialist Mike Good told mission controllers.

McArthur is scheduled to lift the telescope off its "lazy Susan"-like work platorm called the Flight Support System at 7:11 a.m. EDT.

Atlantis spacewalkers Good and Mike Massimino will be dressed in spacesuit undergarments, ready to fully suit up and step outside the shuttle if there are any problems unhooking Hubble from its base.

Hubble's release is scheduled for 8:53 a.m. EDT, but managers said the time could slip by four minutes to ensure good radio communication.

"Hubble is now ready to resume its role as humankind's most powerful eyes on the Universe," program managers told the astronauts in their morning notes.

Check out this NASA TV schedule for a look at upcoming mission highlights all the way through Friday's planned 10:03 a.m. landing at Kennedy Space Center.

Note that the target landing time has been pushed back a little over an hour. Mission managers decided they would have a better chance of good weather conditions at that time, which requires a descent one orbit earlier than previously planned.

You can follow all of today's action live by clicking on the NASA TV picture above to launch a viewer.