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From: starrfie@hydro.la.asu.edu (Sumner Starrfield) Subject: MCC Status Report 04 Date: Sat, 4 Dec 93 9:33:41 MST Mission Control Center STS-61 Status Report #4 Friday, December 3, 1993, 6 p.m. CST As the Space Shuttle Endeavour gained ground on the Hubble Space Telescope in preparation for an early morning rendezvous and grapple, the seven-member crew was awakened to the strains of "Here I Come" by Rare Earth. All of Endeavour's systems continued to function well as the crew got a full day's sleep in preparation for this evening's exacting rendezvous ballet. Endeavour is circling the Earth every 95 minutes in a 317 by 303 nautical mile orbit, about 190 nautical miles behind HST at the beginning of the third flight day and closing the distance between the orbiter and telescope at 60 nautical miles per orbit. The closing speed will remain the same until the next reaction control system firing, scheduled for 8:34 p.m. CST (MET 1/17:07). The NH burn will change the shuttle's velocity by 4.6 feet per second, adjusting the high point of Endeavour's orbit and fine-tuning its course toward a point 40 miles behind HST. The next burn, an orbital maneuvering system firing designated NC3, is scheduled for 9:22 p.m. (MET 1/17:55) and will change Endeavour's velocity by 12.4 feet per second. That burn will adjust Endeavour's catch-up rate to about 16 nautical miles per orbit and put it 8 n.m. behind HST two orbits later. A third burn of just 1.8 feet per second, called NPC and designed to fine tune two spacecrafts' ground tracks, is scheduled for 9:58 p.m. CST (MET 1/18:31). The multiaxis RCS terminal initiation or "TI" burn, which places Endeavour on an intercept course with HST and sets up Commander Dick Covey's manual control of the final stages of the rendezvous, is set for 12:35 a.m. (MET 1/21:08). Mission Specialist Claude Nicollier is scheduled to grapple HST with the orbiter's 50-foot robot arm at about 2:45 a.m. Saturday as Endeavour passes over Australia and the South Pacific. Berthing in the payload bay is expected at about 3:47 a.m. CST, and a survey using the robot arm cameras is set to begin at 4:08 a.m. CST. Earlier in the day, controllers at the Space Telescope Operations Control Center at the Goddard Space Flight Center uplinked commands to stow HST's two high-gain antennae. Controllers received indications that both antennae had nested properly against the body of the telescope, but microswitches on two latches of one antenna and one latch on the other did not send the "ready to latch" signal to the ground. Controllers decided not to attempt to close the latches, as the antennae are in a stable configuration. The situtation is not expected to affect plans for rendezvous, grapple and servicing of the telescope, however flight controllers are working on plans for additional visual inspections during the camera survey.
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