Contributed by: filbert Saturday, July 30 2005 @ 08:29 AM CST
the discovery would rekindle debate over whether Pluto can be regarded as a planet at all.
Station managers want Discovery to stay one more day[*2] .
“The crew of Discovery and on the current space station assignment are looking at what, if anything, we can do while Discovery is there to pre-position the station for a longer gap between flights should there be one,” NASA administrator Michael Griffin told reporters via teleconference, stressing that it is much too soon to assume NASA’s next shuttle flight is beyond 2005.
Spacewalk[*3] starts to test shuttle repair methods.
On the first of three spacewalks scheduled for the STS-114 shuttle mission, Noguchi and Robinson are scheduled to test repair methods for the shuttle’s heatshield tiles, and restore power to a failed control moment gyroscope, which, together with others, helps the station maintain its correct position in space.
Debris problem update: NASA Administrator Griffin is optimistic[*4] .
“We are going to fix it in short order and we are going to get back to flying,” Griffin said in his first press conference since NASA decided July 27 to ground the shuttle fleet until the problem is solved.
Is he whistling past the Shuttle’s graveyard?