945A 11/16 Update: Crew awake; station rendezvous, docking on tap

=================================

CBS NEWS STS-126 STATUS REPORT: 18
Posted: 9:40 AM, 11/16/08

By William Harwood
CBS News Space Analyst

Changes and additions:

   SR-16 (11/15/08): MMT briefing; KU antenna glitches; lost insulation strip discussed
   SR-17 (11/15/08): Mission status briefing; presumed lost insulation still in place; analysis continues
   SR-18 (11/16/08): Shuttle closes in on space station; crew awake

=================================

9:40 AM, 11/16/08, Update: Shuttle Endeavour closes in on space station

The shuttle Endeavour is closing in on the international space station today, on track for a docking at 5:04 p.m. The shuttle astronauts were awakened at 9:25 a.m. by a recording of the Rolling Stones' "Start Me Up" transmitted from mission control in Houston.

"Good morning, Endeavour. And a special good morning to you today, Sandy," astronaut Shannon Lucid called from the control center.

"And good morning, Shannon," space station flight engineer Sandra Magnus replied from the shuttle. "I want to thank my family for that music and I'm looking forward to moving into my new home today."

Magnus will remain behind aboard the station when Endeavour undocks Thanksgiving or the day after, replacing outgoing flight engineer Gregory Chamitoff, who was launched to the outpost last June. Chamitoff will return to Earth in Magnus' place aboard Endeavour.

Today's terminal rendezvous sequence begins at 2:26 p.m. Trailing the station by about 9.2 miles, commander Chris Ferguson will fire the shuttle's maneuvering rockets to begin a slow approach, moving into position about 600 feet directly below the lab complex by around 4 p.m. At that point, he plans to guide Endeavour through a slow back flip, exposing the shuttle's belly to the station for a heat shield photo survey by the lab's crew. Those pictures, taken with 400-mm and 800-mm telephoto lenses, will be downlinked to Houston to help engineers assess the health of the shuttle's thermal protection system.

Because of on-going problems, the shuttle's KU-band antenna system may not work in radar mode today. If not, Ferguson and his crewmates will use Endeavour's star trackers to supply long-range navigation data, a backup procedure that has been used in at least one previous station rendezvous. Ferguson and his crewmates are trained in the procedure and flight controllers do not expect any difficulty if the radar does, in fact, fail to operate properly.

After the rendezvous (or rotational) pitch maneuver, or RPM, is complete, Ferguson will guide Endeavour up to a point about 300 feet directly in front of the station. From there, with the shuttle's nose pointed toward deep space and its open payload bay facing the station, Ferguson will manually guide the orbiter to a docking at a port on the front of the Harmony module around 5:04 p.m.

Here is an updated timeline of today's activity (in EST and mission elapsed time; supersedes rev. A of NASA's TV schedule; rendezvous times approximate):

EST........DD...HH...MM...EVENT

11/16/08
09:25 AM...01...13...30...STS/ISS crew wakeup (begin FD-3)
11:15 AM...01...15...20...Group B computer powerup
11:25 AM...01...15...30...ISS daily planning conference
11:30 AM...01...15...35...Rendezvous timeline begins
12:10 PM...01...16...15...NH rendezvous rocket firing
12:30 PM...01...16...35...Spacesuits removed from airlock
12:52 PM...01...16...57...NC-4 rendezvous rocket firing
02:04 PM...01...18...09...ISS in docking orientation

02:26 PM...01...18...31...TI burn
03:02 PM...01...19...07...Sunset
03:19 PM...01...19...24...U.S. solar arrays feathered
03:24 PM...01...19...29...Range: 10,000 feet
03:33 PM...01...19...38...Range: 5,000 feet
03:36 PM...01...19...41...Sunrise
03:38 PM...01...19...43...Range: 3,000 feet
03:43 PM...01...19...48...MC-4 rendezvous burn
03:47 PM...01...19...52...Range: 1,500 feet
03:49 PM...01...19...54...RPM start window open
03:52 PM...01...19...57...Range: 1,000 feet
03:55 PM...01...20...00...KU antenna to low power
03:56 PM...01...20...01...+R bar arrival directly below ISS
04:01 PM...01...20...06...Range: 600 feet
04:03 PM...01...20...08...Start pitch maneuver
04:05 PM...01...20...10...Noon
04:11 PM...01...20...16...End pitch maneuver
04:12 PM...01...20...17...RPM full photo window close
04:13 PM...01...20...18...Initiate pitch up maneuver (575 ft)
04:21 PM...01...20...26...RPM start window close
04:25 PM...01...20...30...+V bar arrival; range: 310 feet
04:26 PM...01...20...31...Range: 300 feet
04:30 PM...01...20...35...Range: 250 feet
04:33 PM...01...20...38...Sunset
04:34 PM...01...20...39...Range: 200 feet
04:36 PM...01...20...41...Range: 170 feet
04:38 PM...01...20...43...Range: 150 feet
04:42 PM...01...20...47...Range: 100 feet
04:43 PM...01...20...48...Russian ground station AOS
04:45 PM...01...20...50...Range: 75 feet
04:49 PM...01...20...54...Range: 50 feet
04:53 PM...01...20...58...Range: 30 feet; start stationkeeping
04:58 PM...01...21...03...End stationkeeping; push to dock
05:02 PM...01...21...07...Range: 10 feet

05:04 PM...01...21...09...DOCKING

05:08 PM...01...21...13...Sunrise
05:25 PM...01...21...30...Leak checks
05:30 PM...01...21...35...Post docking laptop reconfig
05:55 PM...01...22...00...Orbiter docking system prepped for ingress
06:00 PM...01...22...05...Group B computer powerdown
06:15 PM...01...22...20...Hatch open
06:45 PM...01...22...50...Welcome aboard!
06:55 PM...01...23...00...Safety briefing
07:25 PM...01...23...25...Shuttle-station power transfer system activation
07:30 PM...01...23...35...Soyuz seatliner transfer/installation
07:30 PM...01...23...35...Mission status briefing on NASA TV
07:30 PM...01...23...35...SSRMS grapples OBSS
08:00 PM...02...00...05...SSRMS unberths OBSS
09:00 PM...02...01...05...SRMS grapples OBSS
09:30 PM...02...01...35...SSRMS ungrapples OBSS
09:45 PM...02...01...50...SOKOL suit leak check
10:20 PM...02...02...25...Docking video playback

11/17/08
Mon 12:55 AM...02...05...00...ISS crew sleep begins
Mon 01:25 AM...02...05...30...STS crew sleep begins

=================================

Quick-Launch Web Links:

CBS News STS-126 Status Reports:
http://www.cbsnews.com/network/news/space/current.html

CBS News STS-126 Quick-Look Page:
http://www.cbsnews.com/network/news/space/currentglance.html

NASA ISS Expeditions Page:
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/index.html

NASA Shuttle Web: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/shuttle/index.html
NASA Station Web: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/station/index.html
Spaceflight Now: http://spaceflightnow.com/index.html
GoogleSatTrack: http://www.lizard-tail.com/isana/tracking/

=================================

945a 11/16 Update: Crew awake; station rendezvous, docking on tap

=================================

CBS NEWS STS-126 STATUS REPORT: 18
Posted: 9:40 AM, 11/16/08

By William Harwood
CBS News Space Analyst

Changes and additions:

   SR-16 (11/15/08): MMT briefing; KU antenna glitches; lost insulation strip discussed
   SR-17 (11/15/08): Mission status briefing; presumed lost insulation still in place; analysis continues
   SR-18 (11/16/08): Shuttle closes in on space station; crew awake

=================================

9:40 AM, 11/16/08, Update: Shuttle Endeavour closes in on space station

The shuttle Endeavour is closing in on the international space station today, on track for a docking around 5:04 p.m. The shuttle astronauts were awakened at 9:25 a.m. by a recording of the Rolling Stones' "Start Me Up" transmitted from mission control in Houston.

"Good morning, Endeavour. And a special good morning to you today, Sandy," astronaut Shannon Lucid called from the control center.

"And good morning, Shannon," space station flight engineer Sandra Magnus replied from the shuttle. "I want to thank my family for that music and I'm looking forward to moving into my new home today."

Magnus will remain behind aboard the station when Endeavour undocks Thanksgiving day or the day after, replacing outgoing flight engineer Gregory Chamitoff, who was launched to the outpost last June. Chamitoff will return to Earth in Magnus' place aboard Endeavour.

Today's terminal rendezvous sequence begins at 2:26 p.m. Trailing the station by about 9.2 miles, commander Chris Ferguson will fire the shuttle's maneuvering rockets to begin a slow approach, moving into position about 600 feet directly below the lab complex by around 4 p.m. At that point, he plans to guide Endeavour through a slow back flip, exposing the shuttle's belly to the station for a heat shield photo survey by the lab's crew. Those pictures, taken with 400-mm and 800-mm telephoto lenses, will be downlinked to Houston to help engineers assess the health of the shuttle's thermal protection system.

Because of on-going problems, the shuttle's KU-band antenna system may not work in radar mode today. If not, Ferguson and his crewmates will use Endeavour's star trackers to supply long-range navigation data, a backup procedure that has been used in at least one previous station rendezvous. Ferguson and his crewmates are trained in the procedure and flight controllers do not expect any difficulty if the radar does, in fact, fail to operate properly.

After the rendezvous (or rotational) pitch maneuver, or RPM, is complete, Ferguson will guide Endeavour up to a point about 300 feet directly in front of the station. From there, with the shuttle's nose pointed toward deep space and its open payload bay facing the station, Ferguson will manually guide the orbiter to a docking at a port on the front of the Harmony module around 5:04 p.m.

Here is an updated timeline of today's activity (in EST and mission elapsed time; supersedes rev. A of NASA's TV schedule; rendezvous times approximate):

EST........DD...HH...MM...EVENT

11/16/08
09:25 AM...01...13...30...STS/ISS crew wakeup (begin FD-3)
11:15 AM...01...15...20...Group B computer powerup
11:25 AM...01...15...30...ISS daily planning conference
11:30 AM...01...15...35...Rendezvous timeline begins
12:10 PM...01...16...15...NH rendezvous rocket firing
12:30 PM...01...16...35...Spacesuits removed from airlock
12:52 PM...01...16...57...NC-4 rendezvous rocket firing
02:04 PM...01...18...09...ISS in docking orientation

02:26 PM...01...18...31...TI burn
03:02 PM...01...19...07...Sunset
03:19 PM...01...19...24...U.S. solar arrays feathered
03:24 PM...01...19...29...Range: 10,000 feet
03:33 PM...01...19...38...Range: 5,000 feet
03:36 PM...01...19...41...Sunrise
03:38 PM...01...19...43...Range: 3,000 feet
03:43 PM...01...19...48...MC-4 rendezvous burn
03:47 PM...01...19...52...Range: 1,500 feet
03:49 PM...01...19...54...RPM start window open
03:52 PM...01...19...57...Range: 1,000 feet
03:55 PM...01...20...00...KU antenna to low power
03:56 PM...01...20...01...+R bar arrival directly below ISS
04:01 PM...01...20...06...Range: 600 feet
04:03 PM...01...20...08...Start pitch maneuver
04:05 PM...01...20...10...Noon
04:11 PM...01...20...16...End pitch maneuver
04:12 PM...01...20...17...RPM full photo window close
04:13 PM...01...20...18...Initiate pitch up maneuver (575 ft)
04:21 PM...01...20...26...RPM start window close
04:25 PM...01...20...30...+V bar arrival; range: 310 feet
04:26 PM...01...20...31...Range: 300 feet
04:30 PM...01...20...35...Range: 250 feet
04:33 PM...01...20...38...Sunset
04:34 PM...01...20...39...Range: 200 feet
04:36 PM...01...20...41...Range: 170 feet
04:38 PM...01...20...43...Range: 150 feet
04:42 PM...01...20...47...Range: 100 feet
04:43 PM...01...20...48...Russian ground station AOS
04:45 PM...01...20...50...Range: 75 feet
04:49 PM...01...20...54...Range: 50 feet
04:53 PM...01...20...58...Range: 30 feet; start stationkeeping
04:58 PM...01...21...03...End stationkeeping; push to dock
05:02 PM...01...21...07...Range: 10 feet

05:04 PM...01...21...09...DOCKING

05:08 PM...01...21...13...Sunrise
05:25 PM...01...21...30...Leak checks
05:30 PM...01...21...35...Post docking laptop reconfig
05:55 PM...01...22...00...Orbiter docking system prepped for ingress
06:00 PM...01...22...05...Group B computer powerdown
06:15 PM...01...22...20...Hatch open
06:45 PM...01...22...50...Welcome aboard!
06:55 PM...01...23...00...Safety briefing
07:25 PM...01...23...25...Shuttle-station power transfer system activation
07:30 PM...01...23...35...Soyuz seatliner transfer/installation
07:30 PM...01...23...35...Mission status briefing on NASA TV
07:30 PM...01...23...35...SSRMS grapples OBSS
08:00 PM...02...00...05...SSRMS unberths OBSS
09:00 PM...02...01...05...SRMS grapples OBSS
09:30 PM...02...01...35...SSRMS ungrapples OBSS
09:45 PM...02...01...50...SOKOL suit leak check
10:20 PM...02...02...25...Docking video playback

11/17/08
Mon 12:55 AM...02...05...00...ISS crew sleep begins
Mon 01:25 AM...02...05...30...STS crew sleep begins

=================================

Quick-Launch Web Links:

CBS News STS-126 Status Reports:
http://www.cbsnews.com/network/news/space/current.html

CBS News STS-126 Quick-Look Page:
http://www.cbsnews.com/network/news/space/currentglance.html

NASA ISS Expeditions Page:
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/index.html

NASA Shuttle Web: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/shuttle/index.html
NASA Station Web: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/station/index.html
Spaceflight Now: http://spaceflightnow.com/index.html
GoogleSatTrack: http://www.lizard-tail.com/isana/tracking/

=================================

Presspass - News Edition

	Charleston.net News Commercial Real Estate Subscribe to the Post & Courier Place a Classified Ad	Spending to make money
			About two years ago, while reviewing designs for the new College of Charleston basketball arena, Bobby Marlowe suddenly realized something was missing â€" a president's suite. "I had always assumed there would be some type of box there for entertaining and donor cultivation," said Marlowe, chairman of the university's board of trustees.
Enjoy a every Sunday Only In The Post & Courier find locations		Excavation stirs interest in history Sometime this winter, contractors for Noisette Co. will begin excavating a parking lot at the old Navy base to turn it into a basin lake park. They don't expect to find any remnants of the two canals that ran between the Ashley and Cooper rivers, any coins, pipes or musket balls from what could have been 4,000 soldiers camped between them. They don't expect to locate the legendary, long lost Quarter House. But they could. Hundreds of local protesters join rallies around country Holly Thomas and her 5-year-old son, Juan, joined hundreds in a march to support gay civil rights Saturday in Charleston. Thomas, who is gay, adopted Juan when he was 8 months old. She and her former partner are co-parents of Juan and another child even though they no longer live together. "Parents are all different shapes and sizes these days," she said. Another sad birthday Today is Brandy Hanna's birthday. There won't be a party, or a fancy dinner, no one to joke about calling the fire department to put out the 36 candles on her cake. No, this day will pass like the past 1,270 â€" with her mother, Donna Parent, waiting for the phone to ring. You see, Brandy is missing. Order of Tents true to Christian code Muffled voices sound behind the dark wooden door as a young man gently raps his knuckles against the weathered finish. The door swings open, revealing a group of women clad all in white. They smile and invite him in to find his grandmother. But they will speak no more of their business until he leaves.
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Presspass - Sports Edition

	Charleston.net News Commercial Real Estate Subscribe to the Post & Courier Place a Classified Ad	Third-ranked Gators humble Gamecocks
			GAINESVILLE, FLA. â€" The following are distinct possibilities for South Carolina: Beating Clemson in a couple of weeks. Netting a New Year's Day bowl bid. Winning that bowl game, something that's happened just four times in school history. Landing another top-10 recruiting class come February. All in all, the Gamecocks could easily prove that, with Steve Spurrier running things, they're on the rise.
		Third-ranked Gators humble Gamecocks GAINESVILLE, FLA. â€" The following are distinct possibilities for South Carolina: Beating Clemson in a couple of weeks. Netting a New Year's Day bowl bid. Winning that bowl game, something that's happened just four times in school history. Landing another top-10 recruiting class come February. All in all, the Gamecocks could easily prove that, with Steve Spurrier running things, they're on the rise. Tigers put it together, dominate Blue Devils CLEMSON â€" That's more like it. C.J. Spiller had 179 yards of total offense and scored two touchdowns and the Clemson defense stuffed Duke all game as the Tigers cruised to a 31-7 victory over the Blue Devils Saturday afternoon before an announced homecoming crowd of 75,000 at Death Valley. Temple free throws doom the Cougars When the game was on the line Saturday, so was Temple, and there was absolutely nothing the College of Charleston could do about it. Trailing and forced to foul late in the game, Charleston watched as the Owls made 10 of 10 from the free-throw line in the final 1:24 to pull out a 70-65 victory in the semifinals of the Charleston Classic at Carolina First Arena. "We obviously didn't play really well, but we had a chance," said Charleston coach Bobby Cremins. Clemson stops TCU with defense Clemson has a lot of offensive weapons, but sometimes good team defense can be a weapon as well. The Tigers held TCU to one basket over a stretch of 6:32 late in the second half to subdue the Horned Frogs, 70-58, on Saturday night at Carolina First Arena to advance to today's championship game in the Charleston Classic. "I thought we had a chance to open up the game," said Clemson coach Oliver Purnell. "The first half, I thought they controlled the tempo, but our guys hung in there."
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Presspass - Business Edition

	Charleston.net News Commercial Real Estate Subscribe to the Post & Courier Place a Classified Ad	The capital real estate boom
			There is a bright spot in the otherwise gloomy national real estate picture: the rising demand for office space in Washington, thanks to the government's almost unprecedented role in managing the economy and the hopes of lobbyists to influence it. The Washington Post reports that the federal General Services Administration, which leases space for government offices, expects in 2009 to double the amount of new leases it normally acquires in a year.
		Obama proposals include retirement plan changes The election is over and the message is clear â€" the economy is priority one. The big question now is how some of President-elect Barack Obama’s campaign proposals will affect retirees and workers with 401(k) and other retirement accounts. Looking at them a bit closer may reveal some clues. Retail job losses sap an occupational safety net Retail employment has traditionally been relatively resilient in times of recession. But this time, the sector’s job losses have outstripped those of other troubled industries such as automotive manufacturing, financial services and hospitality, according to the latest government jobs data. Somel experts believe many of the industry’s biggest cuts are yet to come. Owners cling to false optimism about home values A recent report showed that more than three-quarters of its real estate agents surveyed said most sellers have unrealistic initial listing prices for their homes. Likewise, an unscientific study found that half of homeowners polled think their home’s price has increased or stayed the same in the past year. Can high-def radio build critical mass? The new service hasn’t gained traction with consumers. For one thing, the signal can be heard only through special digital radio receivers, and just some of the nation’s radio stations offer extra HD channels. Moreover, the digital signal typically doesn’t reach as far as an analog signal.
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830p 11/15 Update: Suspect insulation apparently intact; mission status briefing

=================================

CBS NEWS STS-126 STATUS REPORT: 17
Posted: 8:20 PM, 11/15/08

By William Harwood
CBS News Space Analyst

Changes and additions:

   SR-15 (11/15/08): Heat shield inspection underway; flight controllers ask astronauts to photograph area of possible insulation loss
   SR-16 (11/15/08): MMT briefing; KU antenna glitches; lost insulation strip discussed
   SR-17 (11/15/08): Mission status briefing; presumed lost insulation still in place; analysis continues

=================================

6:30 PM, 11/15/08, Update: Lost insulation blanket not considered serious threat; engineers implement work-arounds for KU antenna glitches (UPDATED at 8:20 p.m. with mission status briefing; presumed lost insulation blanket still in place)

The shuttle Endeavour is in good shape after its climb to space Friday and engineers are only working a handful of relatively minor problems, most noticeably glitches with the shuttle's KU-band antenna, the chairman of NASA's Mission Management Team said today. Based on an evening video inspection, a presumably lost strip of flexible insulation from the shuttle's left aft fuselage apparently is still in place.

"The mission is going extremely well," said MMT Chairman LeRoy Cain. "The crew is in good shape as is Endeavour. ... There are a few very minor things that we have in work that the team is looking at but nothing of overall great significance. The space station program reported to us that the station is in good shape and the crew on board the station is ready for Endeavour and her crew to show up tomorrow."

Cain said an analysis of imagery from Endeavour's night launch Friday is not  yet complete, but poor lighting means a detailed assessment will have to wait until on-orbit inspections are completed later in the mission. The crew was told of two possible debris events late Friday, but Cain said today as far as he's concerned, only one event is currently under discussion.

At roughly 28 seconds after launch, just before the shuttle's three main engines throttled back to 72 percent thrust to ease aerodynamic loads on the vehicle, a piece of debris of some sort, possibly a small strip of flexible reusable surface insulation, or FRSI, appeared in close-up tracking camera footage in the area right above the shuttle's left-side aft umbilical connection plate just below the left orbital maneuvering system rocket pod.

"We have one area that we're looking at from a debris standpoint," Cain said. "Just underneath the left OMS pod, in the area right above the T-0 umbilical plate, there is what we think is a narrow strip of the blanket insulation material that came loose and flew away there. ... This is not an area that is of great concern to us in terms of losing a blanket. As I said, the umbilical plate itself is an aluminum surface that is unprotected by any thermal protection system."

Just after 6 p.m. today, the astronauts took a moment to aim a camera on the shuttle's heat shield inspection boom to photograph the area. To the untrained eye, no obvious damage was apparent and at an 8 p.m. mission status briefing, lead flight director Mike Sarafin said the insulation in that area appeared to be intact and "there's no apparent damage there."

"To me, I saw the launch imagery at 28 seconds, it looked like something was clearly there, it wasn't there in a previous frame or two of the ascent imagery," Sarafin said. "What the root cause of that is, I'll wait until we get all the imagery data on the ground."

FRSI insulation is used in areas of the shuttle where re-entry heating does not exceed 700 degrees Fahrenheit. Engineers are continuing to study what the debris seen in the launch video might have been.

Cain mentioned two problems with the shuttle's KU-band antenna, a steerable dish antenna mounted near the front right side of the ship's payload bay that automatically finds, locks onto and tracks NASA's data relay satellites. The antenna sends and receives data, voice communications and television signals and can operate in radar mode during rendezvous operations.

In one problem, the antenna fails to maintain lock on a target satellite after getting initial pointing instructions from the shuttle's computers. Cain said flight controllers can work around the glitch by operating in what is known as GPC designate mode, in which pointing instructions are continuously sent to the antenna system. While this mode requires additional work by ground controllers, it is transparent to the shuttle's crew.

The second problem involves trouble with automatic handover between KU- and S-band communications. Again, ground controllers will manually oversee such handovers as required with no impact on the mission.

It's not yet clear what is causing the problems. If the loss-of-lock condition is located in the antenna electronics, Cain said, the KU system may not be able to operate in radar mode during Endeavour's rendezvous with the international space station Sunday. In that case, the crew will switch to a backup procedure and use the shuttle's star trackers to provide navigation data during the final stages of the rendezvous.

Cain said all shuttle crews are trained to carry out star tracker rendezvous procedures in case of radar failures.

"In my recollection, we've done at least one (star tracker rendezvous) in the space station assembly sequence, it was on STS-92 (in 2000)," Cain said. "We did exercise a radar-fail rendezvous on that mission."

=================================

Quick-Launch Web Links:

CBS News STS-126 Status Reports:
http://www.cbsnews.com/network/news/space/current.html

CBS News STS-126 Quick-Look Page:
http://www.cbsnews.com/network/news/space/currentglance.html

NASA ISS Expeditions Page:
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/index.html

NASA Shuttle Web: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/shuttle/index.html
NASA Station Web: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/station/index.html
Spaceflight Now: http://spaceflightnow.com/index.html
GoogleSatTrack: http://www.lizard-tail.com/isana/tracking/

=================================

630p 11/15 Update: MMT briefing; KU antenna glitches; possibly lost insulation assessed

=================================

CBS NEWS STS-126 STATUS REPORT: 16
Posted: 6:30 PM, 11/15/08

By William Harwood
CBS News Space Analyst

Changes and additions:

   SR-13 (11/14/08): Shuttle Endeavour roars into orbit
   SR-14 (11/15/08): Endeavour astronauts gear up for heat shield inspection
   SR-15 (11/15/08): Heat shield inspection underway; flight controllers ask astronauts to photograph area of possible insulation loss
   SR-16 (11/15/08): MMT briefing; KU antenna glitches; lost insulation strip discussed

=================================

6:30 PM, 11/15/08, Update: Lost insulation blanket not considered serious threat; engineers implement work-arounds for KU antenna glitches 

The shuttle Endeavour is in good shape after its climb to space Friday and engineers are only working a handful of relatively minor problems, including a possibly lost strip of insulation and glitches with the shuttle's KU-band antenna, the chairman of NASA's Mission Management Team said today.

"The mission is going extremely well," said MMT Chairman LeRoy Cain. "The crew is in good shape as is Endeavour. ... There are a few very minor things that we have in work that the team is looking at but nothing of overall great significance. The space station program reported to us that the station is in good shape and the crew on board the station is ready for Endeavour and her crew to show up tomorrow."

Cain said an analysis of imagery from Endeavour's night launch Friday is not  yet complete, but poor lighting means a detailed assessment will have to wait until on-orbit inspections are completed later in the mission. The crew was told of two possible debris events late Friday, but Cain said today as far as he's concerned, only one event appears confirmed.

At roughly 33 seconds after launch, as the shuttle's three main engines were throttling back to 72 percent thrust to ease aerodynamic loads on the vehicle, a small strip of flexible reusable surface insulation, or FRSI, appeared to pull away from the orbiter's fuselage right above its left-side aft umbilical connection plate just below the left orbital maneuvering system rocket pod.

"We have one area that we're looking at from a debris standpoint," Cain said. "Just underneath the left OMS pod, in the area right above the T-0 umbilical plate, there is what we think is a narrow strip of the blanket insulation material that came loose and flew away there. ... This is not an area that is of great concern to us in terms of losing a blanket. As I said, the umbilical plate itself is an aluminum surface that is unprotected by any thermal protection system."

Just after 6 p.m. today, the astronauts took a moment to aim a camera on the shuttle's heat shield inspection boom to photograph the area. To the untrained eye, no obvious damage was apparent.

Cain said the presumably lost strip measured roughly 12 to 18 inches long, 4 inches wide and 0.3 inches thick. FRSI insulation is used in areas of the shuttle where re-entry heating does not exceed 700 degrees Fahrenheit and while engineers will carry out a thorough assessment, the loss of insulation in that area would not appear to be an issue of any consequence.

Cain mentioned two problems with the shuttle's KU-band antenna, a steerable dish antenna mounted near the front right side of the ship's payload bay that automatically finds, locks onto and tracks NASA's data relay satellites. The antenna sends and receives data, voice communications and television signals and can operate in radar mode during rendezvous operations.

In one problem, the antenna fails to maintain lock on a target satellite after getting initial pointing instructions from the shuttle's computers. Cain said flight controllers can work around the glitch by operating in what is known as GPC designate mode, in which pointing instructions are continuously sent to the antenna system. While this mode requires additional work by ground controllers, it is transparent to the shuttle's crew.

The second problem involves trouble with automatic handover between KU- and S-band communications. Again, ground controllers will manually oversee such handovers as required with no impact on the mission.

It's not yet clear what is causing the problems. If the loss-of-lock condition is located in the antenna electronics, Cain said, the KU system may not be able to operate in radar mode during Endeavour's rendezvous with the international space station Sunday. In that case, the crew will switch to a backup procedure and use the shuttle's star trackers to provide navigation data during the final stages of the rendezvous.

Cain said all shuttle crews are trained to carry out star tracker rendezvous procedures in case of radar failures.

"In my recollection, we've done at least one (star tracker rendezvous) in the space station assembly sequence, it was on STS-92 (in 2000)," Cain said. "We did exercise a radar-fail rendezvous on that mission."

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Quick-Launch Web Links:

CBS News STS-126 Status Reports:
http://www.cbsnews.com/network/news/space/current.html

CBS News STS-126 Quick-Look Page:
http://www.cbsnews.com/network/news/space/currentglance.html

NASA ISS Expeditions Page:
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/index.html

NASA Shuttle Web: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/shuttle/index.html
NASA Station Web: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/station/index.html
Spaceflight Now: http://spaceflightnow.com/index.html
GoogleSatTrack: http://www.lizard-tail.com/isana/tracking/

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