NASA STS-133 Report #06 Sunday, Feb. 27, 2011 – 7:00 a.m. CST
Mission Control Center, Houston, Texas
HOUSTON – With more than 2,000 pounds of supplies and hardware to deliver to the International Space Station, space shuttle Discovery’s crew has a busy day of transfer work ahead of them.
The crew’s wakeup call to begin their fourth day in space came at 6:23 a.m., giving them 30 minutes of extra sleep to make up for a later than expected bedtime on Saturday. The wakeup song for the day, “Java Jive” as performed by The Manhattan Transfer quartet, was played for Commander Steve Lindsey. STS-133 is Lindsey’s fifth shuttle mission and third visit to the space station.
In all, Lindsey, Pilot Eric Boe and Mission Specialists Alvin Drew, Steve Bowen, Michael Barratt and Nicole Stott have a combined total of 9 hours of transfer work on their schedule for the day, moving cargo brought up on the shuttle’s middeck over to the space station. Over the course of the mission, the 2,000 pounds of cargo brought up on the shuttle will be replaced by 2,600 pounds of cargo from the space station that Discovery will be returning to Earth.
When they’re not ferrying cargo across the hatches, Lindsey, Boe, Barratt and Stott will work together to move the shuttle’s orbiter boom sensor system from its perch on the edge of the shuttle’s cargo bay and into the grasp of the shuttle’s robotic arm, where it will be ready if needed for a focused inspection of Discovery’s heat shield. Due to the position of the shuttle, while docked at the station, the shuttle robotic arm isn’t able to pick the boom up on its own, and requires it to be handed off by the station’s robotic arm. The station’s robotic arm was moved into place for this activity overnight by robotics officers on the ground.
At 1:43 p.m., Discovery’s crew, along with station Commander Scott Kelly and Flight Engineer Cady Coleman, will take time out of their activities to talk with reporters with The Weather Channel, WBZ Radio of Boston, WBS-TV of Atlanta, and WTVT-TV of Tampa, Fla.
Near the end of their day, the crews will get together to go over the plan for Monday’s spacewalk, the first of the mission. Afterward, spacewalkers Bowen and Drew will move into the station’s Quest airlock, where they’ll be spending the night at a lower air pressure than the rest of the station.
The next shuttle status report will be issued at the end of the crew’s day or earlier if warranted. The crew is scheduled to begin their sleep period at 9:23 p.m.
