STS-92 Status Report # 19 October 20, 2000 – 6 p.m. CDT
Discovery astronauts
undocked from the International Space Station Friday after a successful
6-day, 21-hour and 23-minute visit that saw addition of two major elements
to the station and four consecutive days of spacewalks to complete those
elements’ linkup to the orbiting laboratory.
Undocking occurred
at 10:08 a.m. CDT as Discovery and the ISS were east-northeast of Brazil’s
capital Brasilia. After springs in the shuttle’s docking system provided
an initial push, Pilot Pam Melroy, using Discovery’s maneuvering thrusters,
slowly backed the Shuttle away from the station. The station was parallel
to the Earth’s surface and sideways to the direction of travel. Discovery,
with its nose pointed downward and its right wing in the direction of
travel, dropped behind the station, then maneuvered downward.
The final separation
burn was executed about 45 minutes after undocking, moving Discovery
into a lower, faster orbit to move it away from the larger and more
complete station they had helped prepare for the early November arrival
of the first resident crew. They added 10 tons to the station’s mass,
bringing it to about 80 tons. In addition to the total of 27 hours,
19 minutes spent outside the station on the four spacewalks, the astronauts
spent 27 hours and 4 minutes inside, completing connections with the
new elements and transferring equipment and supplies for that first
crew.
During five missions
to the ISS, shuttles have spent a total of 33 days, 4 hours and 44 minutes
docked to the International Space Station. Crews completed 20 days,
8 hours and 26 minutes of work inside the station, and 2 days, 21 hours
and 34 minutes outside during 10 space walks.
Following undocking
and separation, Commander Brian Duffy, Melroy, Mission Specialists Leroy
Chiao, Bill McArthur, Mike Lopez-Alegria, Jeff Wisoff and Koichi Wakata
enjoyed half a day off. Their scheduled sleep period begins at 9:17
p.m. They will be awakened at 5:17 a.m. Saturday morning to prepare
for a landing Kennedy Space Center on Sunday afternoon.
The next Mission
Control Center status report will be issued about 6 a.m. Saturday, or
as events warrant.
