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From: starrfie@hydro.la.asu.edu (Sumner Starrfield) Subject: MCC Status Report 15 Date: Thu, 9 Dec 93 12:55:45 MST MISSION CONTROL CENTER STS-61 Status Report #15 8 a.m. CST Thursday, December 9, 1993 STS-61 space walking astronauts Story Musgrave and Jeff Hoffman got front row seats to the successful deployment of the Hubble Space Telescope's two solar arrays early Thursday during the mission's fifth and final scheduled spacewalk. The astronauts were in Space Shuttle Endeavour's payload bay after having completed their scheduled tasks when, at the end of their seven hour and 21 minute spacewalk, the telescope's solar arrays were smoothly unfurled. Today's spacewalk made STS-61 the first U.S. shuttle mission to include five space walks. STS-61's four space walking crew members spent a total of 35 hours and 28 minutes in Endeavour's payload bay. A concern that developed Wednesday afternoon involving a loss of data lock on downlink telemetry from the telescope's main flight computer (DF- 224) was resolved after scientists determined that the data glitch was due to imprecise pointing of the shuttle's Ku-Band antenna at the orbiting Tracking and Data Relay Satellite, which resulted in intermittent interruptions in the telemetry and communication between the telescope and ground controllers. Thursday's spacewalk began at 9:30 p.m. CST Wednesday with the replacement of the Solar Array Drive Electronics, which control the arrays' ability to point toward the Sun and generate electricity to power the telescope. Astronauts completed that installation about 1 a.m. CST Thursday. Shortly afterwards, Musgrave gently pushed on each of the solar arrays, giving them what they needed to unfold the solar wings' Primary Deployment Mechanism which had stuck earlier in the crew's work day. Hoffman and Musgrave completed the installation of the Goddard High Resolution Spectrograph Redundancy Kit on the telescope about 2:30 a.m. CST. Crew members then moved to the top of the telescope and installed two mylar covers over the original magnetometers to contain any contamination or debris that might come off the instrument and protect it from ultraviolet degradation. Shortly after that task and while perched on the shuttle's robot arm, Musgrave paid tribute to the training team who worked with the crew in preparation for this mission's spacewalks. "You're in our hearts," Musgrave said. "You're in our heads. What we've done and what we're going to do is simply a reflection on what you've given us." The space walking duo then received word from ground controllers that the GHRS Kit had received a good health check. "It'll make some of my astronomy friends happy," said Hoffman, an astronomer himself. "Great, great news." Solar array deploy operations began about 4:05 a.m. CST. The deployment of the first solar array was complete in about five minutes. The deployment of the second array began about 4:30 a.m. CST and it too was complete in about five minutes. The slight twisting of one solar array was expected and attributed to manufacturing tolerance and residual stress that managers believe will ease after the telescope has completed a couple of orbits. Musgrave and Hoffman ended their spacewalk about 4:51 a.m. CST. Ground controllers reported that the refurbished telescope's two High Gain Antennas were deployed about 5:55 a.m. CST. During a 6 a.m. CST press briefing, project managers reported that the SADE aliveness and functional test was nearly complete and that everything looked good so far. Crew members will begin their sleep period at 9:57 a.m. CST and will awaken at 5:57 p.m. today. Hubble's aperture door will be opened a few minutes before the telescope is released from Endeavour's payload bay to begin about a 13-week comprehensive checkout and continue on its scientific gathering journey. Hubble's release is scheduled to occur at 1:08 a.m. CST Friday. All systems on board the shuttle continue to perform well as Endeavour circles the Earth every 95 minutes in a 321 by 320 nautical mile orbit.
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