XA/EVA Project Office Weekly Activity Report May 3, 2001

External Carrier / FSE TIM

The EVA Project Office supported the subject TIM on Monday and Tuesday, 4/23 & 24/01. The purpose of the TIM was to review the current systems architecture to launch, store on-orbit, and return Orbital Replacement Unit (ORU’s) and payloads, identify all issues/disconnects of the user community, and develop a forward action plan for the identified issues. The EVA Project Office was asked to lead a Tiger Team to conduct follow-on meetings to review and revise the ‘External ORU EVA Tool Compatibility’ matrix, draft Interface Control Document (ICD) requirements to be incorporated into ISS External Carriers Office requirement document and the EVA ICD, SSP 30256, and develop rough order of magnitude (ROM) cost and schedule impacts associated with any required EVA hardware modifications. The results of these actions will be reported back to the ISS Program this week.

STS-110 (8A) Baselined

The STS-110 (8A) EVA operations plan was baselined at the EVA Configuration Control Board (EVA CCB) on April 27, 2001. The following significant items were discussed:

• A change request to the mission integration plan (MIP) was discussed to add a fourth EVA to the mission. This EVA would allow completion of mission success tasks such as finalizing the mobile transporter configuration and placing the S0 segment in the final structural configuration by removing loads off the capture claws used to initially mate S0 to the Lab.

• An assessment is in work to determine if the circuit interrupt devices (CIDs 7&8) are required on ISS. The devices provide some benefits by inhibiting power during an EVA. Alternate timesaving means to inhibit power is being considered. Two hours of EVA time could be saved if the CIDs installation tasks are removed from the timeline.

• An alternate EVA timeline is being assessed that would place S0 in its final structural and power configuration without using the launch-to-activation (LTA) cables. This timeline would save time by avoiding a set of power downs to the S0 segment.

  
  

Increment-4 EVA Training

The EVA Project Office supported Increment-4 EVA Training at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center Hydrolab at Star City, Russia during April 2001. The training concentrated on the tasks for the first Increment-4 Russian Segment EVAs. These tasks include the installation of the Service Module Gas Protective Devices as well as CKK and KPOMKA experiment packages. The use of the U.S. Safety Tether by the Increment-4 crew was also successfully negotiated into the plan. Subsequently the U.S. Safety Tether was successfully used in conjunction with the RSC-Energia fairlead devices on the Service Module for the tasks being trained. The content of the next Increment-4 training session was discussed with RSC-Energia personnel, but due to the uncertainty of content in the program the runs have not been finalized.

STS-100/6A Eye Irritation and Boot Fit

On STS-100/6A the Extra-Vehicular (EV) crewmembers experienced two issues in flight while conducting EVA’s. During both EVA’s one of the EV crewmembers experienced eye irritation and was forced to temporarily halt work in progress until the condition cleared. Investigation of this issue centers on testing of suspect materials and samples from STS-100/6A. Upon examination of this data appropriate corrective action will be put in place for the next flight, STS-104/7A. The second issue concerns discomfort experienced in the foot by several EV crewmembers over the last few flights. The issue was addressed prior to STS-100/6A and remedial corrective action was put into place, which included changing the sizing of certain boot components. One EV crewmember still experienced discomfort on STS-100/6A. As a result, previous corrective actions are being re-examined and communication with EV crewmembers from multiple flights has been intensified to understand this issue.

Original signed by

G. Allen Flynt

Acting Manager