STS-120
Report #31
4 a.m. CST Wednesday, Nov. 7, 2007
Mission Control Center, Houston, Texas
HOUSTON – The astronauts on space shuttle Discovery are only hours away from a landing in Florida that will conclude a successful 15-day mission that delivered a new module and repaired a damaged solar array on the International Space Station.
This morning’s wakeup song, “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” by Sherman and Sherman, was played at 1:38 a.m. CST for Commander Pam Melroy.
Deorbit preparations begin at 7:03 a.m. and the crew should get the okay to close the payload bay doors at 8:19 a.m. If systems are good and the weather cooperates, Melroy will conduct the deorbit burn at 10:59 a.m. That will slow Discovery enough to fall out of orbit to begin its descent toward a landing at the Kennedy Space Center’s Shuttle Landing Facility at 12:01 p.m. CST.
A landing on that opportunity will wrap up Mission Specialist Clay Anderson’s flight to the International Space Station after 152 days in space.
There is another landing opportunity on the following orbit, which would put touchdown at 1:36 p.m. CST.
Aboard the International Space Station today, Expedition 16 Commander Peggy Whitson and Flight Engineers Yuri Malenchenko and Dan Tani will review the plan for Friday’s spacewalk. Whitson and Malenchenko will undo connections between the Destiny laboratory and Pressurized Mating Adapter 2, in advance of robotics operations next week. That work will relocate PMA-2 to the new Harmony module, then move both of them into place on the front of the lab.
The next STS-120 status report will be issued Wednesday afternoon or earlier if events warrant.