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Last Updated: Dec 15, 2007 - 2:55:41 AM |
HOUSTON - The day has come for Barbara Morgan to fulfill the legacy teacher Christa McAuliffe dreamed of: Talking to students from space. On Tuesday, Morgan will speak with students in Idaho, where she taught elementary classes before moving to Houston in 1998 to become the first teacher to train as a full-fledged astronaut.
She finally launched into space on Aug. 8 aboard the shuttle Endeavour, after a two-decade wait.
Morgan was McAuliffe's backup for Challenger's doomed mission in 1986.
Before the educational event, Morgan said in television interviews that seeing the international space station as the shuttle pulled in for docking was "truly an astonishing sight."
"It's more than you can imagine even with all the pictures that you've seen and everything," she said. "To see it in real life it's amazing."
Her educational chat likely will include questions from students ranging from what it's like to be weightless to how the crew gets clean air aboard the shuttle and what stars look like from space.
Meanwhile, a team of NASA experts was evaluating whether astronauts should fix a deep gash on the Endeavour's belly before the crew returns home. Another team of experts was put together to pick and perfect the best way to fix the gouge and avoid extensive post-flight repairs. A decision was expected by Wednesday.
The gouge is relatively small — 3 1/2 inches by 2 inches — and the damage is benign enough for Endeavour to fly safely home. But part of it penetrates through the protective thermal tiles, leaving just a thin layer of coated felt over the space shuttle's aluminum frame to keep out the more than 2,000-degree heat of re-entry. Fixing any resulting structural damage could be expensive and time-consuming.
To patch the gouge, spacewalking astronauts would have to perch on the end of the shuttle's 100-foot robotic arm and extension boom, be maneuvered under the spacecraft, apply protective black paint and then squirt in a caulk-like goop.
Mission Control told the crew late Monday that officials had ruled out a third repair technique involving a protective plate that could be screwed over the damage.
All three techniques were developed following Columbia's catastrophic re-entry, and NASA has never attempted this type of repair on an orbiting shuttle. Only the black paint has been tested in space.
Astronauts Rick Mastracchio and Dave Williams have trained extensively on the ground and could perform any necessary repairs during the mission's fourth spacewalk, which is set for Friday but may be pushed back to Saturday. NASA managers are also considering extending the mission beyond 14 days to complete the repairs, if needed.
The astronauts' last tile-repair class was just three or four weeks before launch.
"I think that regardless of what repair method is chosen over the next day or so, we could execute it if required," said John Shannon, chairman of the mission management team.
Covering the exposed white coated felt with black protective paint would keep heat from building up in the cavity, Shannon said. Squirting in the caulk-like goop from a tank attached to the astronauts' spacesuit backpack would provide extra protection. The spacewalkers would apply the paint first to make sure the goop stuck.
If the repairs are ordered, astronauts on the ground will practice repairing a replica of the gouge underwater so they can create precise instructions for the spacewalkers and their crewmates.
Mastracchio and Williams have already completed two spacewalks in three days. On Monday, they removed a 600-plus-pound gyroscope from the space station's exterior that failed last October. They installed a new one in its place that was carried up aboard Endeavour. The space station has four gyroscopes to keep it steady and pointed in the right direction.
Another task on the mission to-do list, installing a new storage platform on the space station, was completed Tuesday. Morgan and her crewmates used Endeavour's robotic arm to pull the platform from the ship's cargo bay. Astronauts then passed it off to the station's robotic arm for installation.
"I'm just so proud of her and how she's going to do all this and do the work of an astronaut as well as a teacher," Morgan's husband, Clay Morgan, said as she worked with the crew Tuesday morning. "Just grin and watch."
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On the Net:
NASA: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov
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