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Shuttle crew spacewalks, tests repair methods

Posted on: Saturday, 30 July 2005, 12:35 CDT

By Irene Klotz and Jeff Franks

HOUSTON (Reuters) - Two shuttle Discovery astronauts completed a seven-hour spacewalk on Saturday to restore a critical steering device on the International Space Station and test shuttle heat shield repairs that NASA hopes will prevent another Columbia disaster.

"What a view," Japan's Soichi Noguchi said as he drifted out of Discovery's airlock into the open payload bay and looked down on Southeast Asia 224 miles below.

"Yeah, it's been a long road," said spacewalking partner and U.S. astronaut Steve Robinson.

The spacewalk was NASA's first at the International Space Station since November 2002.

After taking a few minutes to acclimatize to the vastness of open space, Noguchi and Robinson, both first time spacewalkers, used a specially designed caulking gun and putty knives to try to repair sample shuttle heat shield tiles and wing panels that had been purposefully damaged.

The astronauts worked only on the sample materials in the payload bay and did not touch any of the minor damage caused during liftoff to Discovery's heat shield, which is believed to be in good shape for landing.

NASA lost shuttle Columbia and its seven astronauts during the last landing attempt on Feb. 1, 2003. The ship's wing had been damaged during launch by falling debris and as the shuttle sailed through the atmosphere for landing, hot gases blasted inside the hole, tearing the ship apart as it flew over Texas.

Robinson got to work first, squeezing out thick black beads of a heat-resistant product called NOAX, then working the material into cracks and gouges in the sample wing panel.

'PIZZA DOUGH'

"I see just a little bit of bubbling," he said. "It's about like pizza dough."

Noguchi then used another device similar to a shoe polish applicator to dab a material, known as an emittance wash, on to damaged heat-shield tile samples.

Engineers will study the repaired sample tiles and wing panels after the shuttle returns to Earth.

Noguchi replaced a broken Global Positioning System antenna on the space station, which is used by the orbiting structure's computers to help determine its exact location.

The spacewalkers also swapped a power cable to fix a backup gyroscope which had failed in March. The gyroscope is one of four that keep the station properly positioned without using the station's limited supply of fuel for rocket thrusters.

The astronauts will replace another failed gyroscope during their next spacewalk, scheduled for Monday.

After sailing through all their assigned tasks, the astronauts had some extra time to retrieve two materials science experiments from outside a station airlock.

They also photographed some areas of damage on the shuttle that engineers want more information about while crew members in the shuttle carried out an additional unscheduled scan of Discovery's left wing with a special boom.

In addition to servicing the station, Discovery's flight was designed to test dozens of post-Columbia safety upgrades. NASA's biggest change -- a redesign of the shuttle's fuel tank so that it would not shed foam during launch -- failed its first test-flight, prompting NASA to again ground the remaining shuttle fleet until additional repairs can be made.

Discovery is scheduled to return from space on Aug. 7, but NASA managers said they may extend the mission a day to transfer more supplies to the space station, just in case the next visit by a shuttle is some time down the road.

Source: REUTERS

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