NASA aims to load hypergolic propellants into shuttle Discovery at its beachside launch pad tonight as preparations for the planned April 5 launch of one of the nation's final shuttle missions continues at Kennedy Space Center.
Discovery and seven astronauts are scheduled to blast off from launch pad 39A at 6:27 a.m. April 5, the middle of a 10-minute opportunity to put the shuttle and its crew on course for a rendezvous and docking with the International Station Station. The mission is the first of four final shuttle missions, flights aimed primarily at outfitting the station prior to shuttle fleet retirement.
Engineers will be called to their stations in the Launch Control Center at 10 p.m. tonight and the launch pad area will be cleared of all personnel prior to the hazardous operation. Hypergolic propellants spontaneously ignite on contact with one another.
During the overnight operation, the propellants nitrogen textroxide and monomethyl hydrazine will be loaded into the hump-like pods that house Discovery's twin orbital maneuvering engines and storage tanks that feed the shuttle's 44 nose-and-tail steering thrusters.
The operation also involves loading hydrazine into the orbiter's three Auxiliary Power Units and the Hydraulic Power Units in the bell-shaped nozzle of the ship's twin solid rocket boosters.
The hydrazine fuel and nitrogen textroxide oxidizer are loaded one after the other, rather that at the same time, to avoid the potential for inadvertent ignition.
The critical operation also involves filling Dewar tanks on the launch tower's Fixed Service Structure with liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. The cryogenic reactants are loaded into the orbiter's power-producing fuel cell system during launch countdown.
Discovery and its crew will haul up an Italian-built cargo carrier full of supplies, equipment and spare parts for the station, including a crew quarters rack that will be converted into a space shower. The refrigerator-sized rack will provide privacy for what amounts to sponge baths.
Veteran astronaut Alan Poindexter will command the mission and Jim Dutton will be the pilot. Mission specialists include Clay Anderson, Rick Mastracchio, Stephanie Wilson, Dottie Metcalf-Lindenburger and Naoko Yamazaki of Japan Aerospace Exploation Agency.
NASA will have until April 14 to get the shuttle mission under way or delay until April 30. The sun angle on the station between April 15 and April 29 will be such that the outpost would not be able to generate enough power or dispel enough heat to support a docked shuttle mission.
The next window of opportunity for launch would stretch between April 30 and June 12.
1 comment:
And how many regional newspapers are as well informed and professionals in journalism as we have in the F T? Really, we have one of the highest if not the highest mental power per capita than most places that are known to mankind!
The fact that we are the recorders of history for generations to come in regards to Space exploration...remains...none can take that away from us. And, there was a plan, an approve budget and the people to carry it out...anything else is SPIN! in order to fulfill private agendas...Get over it...the SPIN STOPS HERE! IN BREVARD COUNTY WHERE PEOPLE ARE CAPABLE OF THINKING FOR THEMSELVES AND KNOW TO MEASURE THE SIZE OF A BUILDING BY THE SHADOW THAT IT CASTS!
Our elected officials cast no shadows or very small ones...they must be very emotionally short people!
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