| STS-116 Flight Days 6-10 |
[Dec. 19th, 2006|02:10 am] |
In the course of five days, there have been three spacewalks and considerable attention payed to retracting the port side of the P6 solar array segment on the zenith (upper) side of the International Space Station.
On Flight Day 6, spacewalkers Bob Curbeam and Christer Fuglesang rewired two power channels out of four total as they gradually routed the power from the P4 truss segment solar arrays to the rest of the ISS.
On Flight Day 7, several things were tried from an inside-the-vehicle standpoint to try to finish retracting the partially retracted P6 port-side solar array. The main issue is that grommets in the solar array blankets were sticking to the guide wire.
The P6 solar arrays were rotated in various ways to try to unstick the grommets from the guide wire. As a last resort, Expedition 13 flight engineer Thomas Reiter did power squat exercises to try to induce oscillations and shaking in the P6 solar arrays (a previous ISS Expedition crew member exercised vigorously enough that it was discovered the P6 solar arrays could shake if exercising was done). None of those things tried was able to break free grommets from the guide wire in enough fashion to finish retracting the array.
On Flight Day 8, the other two power channels were wired in the final planned extravehicular activity of the mission. Robert Curbeam and Sunita Williams carried out the spacewalk quick enough that there was time to try something to get that P6 solar array retracted. Curbeam and Williams resorted to shaking the blanket boxes on the array to try to induce enough movement in the solar arrays to break the grommets free of the guide wire. The attempts were not totally successful in retracting the whole array, but more of the array ended up retracted by the end of the EVA.
On Flight Day 9, mission managers decided to carry out a fourth spacewalk, dedicated to the P6 solar array retraction. Curbeam was selected to carry out his fourth spacewalk of the shuttle mission (a shuttle record). Fugelsang was goign to be the other spacewalker.
The fourth spacewalk was carried out on Flight Day 10. Curbeam placed himself in a foothold on the ISS's robotic arm while Fugelsang was the free-floating spacewalker. Curbeam had several tools at his disposal to break any stuck grommets free of the guide wire as well as to re-tension any guide wires that became too loose. Fugelsang was in a position to shake the solar array blanket boxes if needed. By the end of the spacewalk, the port-side of the P6 solar array became totally retracted into the blanket boxes and the boxes latched closed.
Flight Day 11 will see the undocking of the shuttle from the station after a farewell ceremony. On Flight Day 12, final Thermal Protection System (TPS) inspections will be done to make sure no orbital debris breached the TPS during docked operations and some small satellites will be deployed from the payload bay.
Flight Control System checkout and cabin stowage will occur on Flight Day 13 and landing on Flight Day 14 at either Kennedy Space Center, Edwards Air Force Base, or maybe even Northrup Strip at the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico if weather is bad in Florida or California. |
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