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[vsnet-history 1916] MCC Status Report 21 (Starrfield, nova net)




From: starrfie@hydro.la.asu.edu (Sumner Starrfield)
Subject: MCC Status Report 21
Date: Sun, 12 Dec 93 15:11:37 MST

Mission Control Center
STS-61 Status Report #21
Sunday, December 12, 1993, 7 a.m. CST

The STS-61 crew spent their last full day in space on clean-up chores in 
preparation for tonight's scheduled landing at KSC.  The following is a 
summary of the today's mission highlights, with all times given in 
Central Standard Time unless otherwise indicated. 

The first KSC landing opportunity will be at 11:26 p.m. tonight, which is 
12:26 a.m. EST Monday.  The landing time was moved up by 90 minutes to 
allow for two landing opportunities at the Cape due to a forecast of 
degrading weather conditions later in the morning.  A second opportunity 
at KSC exists at 1:08 a.m. Monday.  If the weather does not cooperate 
today, plans are to delay landing until Tuesday, when two landing 
opportunities exist both at KSC and Edwards Air Force Base, California. 

After sleeping in a little longer Saturday afternoon, the astronauts 
awoke to another Willie Nelson favorite, "My Heroes Have Always Been 
Cowboys." 

Commander Dick Covey and Pilot Ken Bowersox conducted the pre-landing 
checkouts of Endeavour and turned on three hydraulic power units to test 
flight control systems for entry.  Covey and Bowersox also practiced 
simulated landings at KSC using a laptop computer software called PILOT. 

The crew participated in a news conference early Sunday morning and told 
reporters that their intense training really paid off and that they were 
proud of their role in demonstrating a sophisticated level of on-orbit 
servicing capability.  Later, Mission Specialist Jeff Hoffman shared 
Hanukkah festivities with his crew mates by spinning small top, a 
traditional holiday toy called a dreidel, in microgravity.  Claude 
Nicollier snacked on a candy Hubble Space Telescope made from Swiss 
chocolate.  The rest of the day was spent stowing equipment for the trip 
home and for some final sightseeing of Earth. 

The crew went to sleep shortly before 8 a.m. and will wake up around 4 
p.m. to start deorbit preparations and unstowing of their pressure suits.  
The deorbit burn for the first landing pass is planned for 10:15 p.m.  
Endeavour will glide across Mexico and the Gulf, crossing the west coast 
of Florida just north of Tampa and making its final left hand turn over 
Orlando for the final approach to the mile-long Runway 15 at KSC.  This 
will be the seventh night landing in the shuttle program, and the second 
night landing at KSC. 

Endeavour continues to perform well as the orbiter circles every 96 
minutes more than 300 miles above Earth. 


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