T-minus 14 minutes and counting. Activities continuing on schedule for this morning's launch of mission 51D, the forward flight of Discovery and its seven-person crew. T-minus 10 minutes and counting. And we're at T-minus 9 minutes and holding. Again, this is a scheduled 10-minute hold, which should extend until 7:55 AM. Launch director Bob Sieck in communication with the Lanky Test Director and the launch team, um explaining that the ship that is in the launch danger area is actually in the SRB impact area, which is about 125 miles east of the launch site. Uh, it is expected that the ship is is leaving the area. Uh, however, because of the cloud cover and the precipitation at some higher levels, uh and the prospect that that condition is not going to get better at least in the very immediate future, uh, Bob Sieck tells the launch team that we're going to try to wait this out for a little while. We're presently in a no-go configuration for launch. We still have a few more minutes uh before we would have to scrub for the day. The Supervisor Range Operations has has given us a final clearance to launch based on being able to pick up the countdown. So, at this point, the only thing continuing to hold us is the weather. We have uh have a go for launch from Launch Director Bob Sieck. We've had some applause breakout in the firing room. So, we have received a final clearance to launch and uh we would expect to proceed with picking up the count in just a few seconds. We're at T-minus 9 minutes and counting. The ground launch sequencer has been initiated. We are in the launch sequencer now and control of the countdown for the remaining nine minutes of this morning's launch. T-minus 8 minutes 30 seconds and counting. T-minus 7 minutes and counting. APU prestart is complete. They will be activated at the T-minus 5 minute mark. Final prestart of the main engines is underway. We're at T-minus 3 minutes 53 seconds and counting. Orbiter aerosurface test has started. Orbital flight control system is now being moved through a preprogrammed pattern to verify that they are ready for launch. Liquid hydrogen replenish has been terminated, LH2 pressurization to flight level is underway. Vehicle now isolated from ground loading equipment. T-minus 1 minute and counting. Sound suppression water system now armed, prelaunch water will be released at T-minus 16 seconds. We have armed the hydrogen burner igniters. They will be fired at the T-minus 10 second mark to eliminate residual hydrogen gas. T-minus 40 seconds and counting. Orbiter vent doors being positioned for launch. Coming up on a go to the Discovery's onboard computers to start their automatic launch sequence. T-minus 31 seconds. We have a go for auto sequence start. Discovery's four redundant computers now assuming primary control of critical vehicle functions. Release of prelift-off water and arming of SRB holddown ordnance will occur at the T-minus 16 second mark, IMU's go to full inertial at T-minus 12 seconds. T-minus 13, 12, 11, 10, 9. We have a go for main engine start. 7, 6, and we have main engine start, 4, 3, 2, 1. We have SRB ignition and liftoff. Liftoff of mission 51D and the seven-member crew of Discovery, and the shuttle has cleared the tower. Mission Control Houston at 2 minutes 50 seconds from liftoff of the TDRS. We've got into the final phase of the pre-deploy procedure. They begin to uh power up the systems to enable the deploy the satellite. Discovery, Houston, we're through Kauai for eight minutes. Roger, we trust our systems. Mission Control Houston. Spin up underway. The spin table on the TDRS is now at 50 RPM. Everything looks phenomenal. TDRS ops reports we're ahead. Deploy attitude. Payload reports the TDRS is now powered up and on internal power. And, uh they are happy with its current deploy. Telemetry has been enabled from the TDRS and the buck share on the ground reports it's receiving good data. Discovery, Houston, you're looking good for deploy. Mission Control Houston. Now 5 minutes 55 seconds to deploy. Payload officer reports all looks good. The propulsion officer reports that the ship is ready to make the Delta-B maneuver. That's moving away from this position once the TDRS is deployed. Discovery, Houston. 30 seconds to LOS Hawaii, T-minus next three minutes. Indications were that we were in good shape for the deploy. The sequencer has been armed for deploying the satellite, which will be spring ejected out of the payload bay. Ready for motion. Clear the bay. We're clear the payload. With a clear deploy with motion. On time. Discovery, Houston. We copy good deploy and it looks good down here. We had a good view of closing, the payload looks beautiful out there. I guess there's a lot easier to launch in a lab than uh what's launching in the shuttle today. No other problems. We're uh we're deploying the uh OMS uh to monitor the burn. Roger, copy. Deploying the RMS and we expect about an 86 second uh time on that uh burn. T-minus a minute for the burn. Roger, copy. We uh have a beautiful view of the TDRS burn uh as just about 86 seconds uh it's faded. It will fade considerably. We could see it for a few more seconds after that. Uh, and we'll uh try to get that down uh to you at the console as soon as possible. Very impressive, because while we were looking at it, there were lightning flashes all over the earth uh that we could see going off while the burn was burning quite nicely and steadily. Roger, we copy that, Jeff. Sounds great. Discovery, the top of the world to you. Yeah, all right, partners. We're still here. Hope you get a good night's sleep. Well, all right, that'll wrap up the show until tomorrow morning. This is Mission Control, the crew aboard Discovery preparing for the deployment of the Syncom satellite coming up in an hour and 25 minutes. Copy that, flight direct. We aim to please. Following that deployment, the orbiter will uh uh fire up its OMS engines, the orbital maneuvering system engines uh to separate from the Syncom spacecraft, uh to be at a safe distance at the time that the Syncom's solid rocket motor is ignited to put it into transfer orbit. Okay, as far as the uh main driving, uh we have the aft forward to initiate the PLO. Okay, Jeff. We copy all that. It sounds real good, and you're looking good for deploy. At 20 minutes prior to deploy, the orbiter begins its automatic maneuver to the deploy attitude. Houston, we started the maneuver to the deploy attitude. Okay, we see that. Digital autopilot will be reconfigured now for the proper configuration for the deployment time. Payload officer reports uh motion on the push-off and. We're going, guys, and we're taking pictures. Outstanding. Super. Mission Control, this is Syncom. Has been deployed from the orbiter. The omni antenna uh should be extending at this point at about 6 and 1/2 minutes after the deployment, the satellite begins its spin up. Houston, this is Discovery. We are watching the Syncom. The Omni antenna is still down. Roger, Ray. Any kind of visual assessment you can give us of the Syncom spin up, etc., would be appreciated. Yeah, the the omni is still down, and we're trying to adjust the flexes now. They are 35 seconds per revolution from what we can tell. Roger. Do uh try to give you feedback on what we are thinking about down here. We'd like you We're going to go ahead and get to a safe separation distance. And we're working on a another maneuver that once we reach that safe separation distance that we can stabilize uh our relative uh uh distance between the Syncom and the orbiter. And uh we'd like to, at that time, then get your attitude in which we can deploy the Syncom. Discovery, Houston, we see through one for 4 minutes. Yeah, Houston, unfortunately, we're watching the dark. Okay, uh we copy, and a couple of notes on what we'd like you to do. Uh, for the time being, we'd like you to remain in the window protect attitude. And uh we're going to let you go and uh the press and orbit for about two revs. And then, we're going to set up a burnt pad, which will kill off the relative rate between uh the Syncom and the orbiter, and that should give you a relative separation of about 40 nautical miles. Okay, Houston, we copy. Discovery, Houston, we're with you through Hawaii and Tigris, and we've got a guest Capcom here that'd like to talk to you about the upcoming events. Okay, uh the system, one minute we are all set here and uh we're ready to talk and to write. Okay, uh, obviously this discussion is going to be about uh Syncom and what the options are for the rest of the mission with respect to it. First off, no decision has been made to do anything at this time. But uh, you know that uh NASA being the successor and outfit it is, that the system is exploring all the possibilities that uh we possibly can. We're working on a formulation process to come up with ideas and we want you, the crew, to be a part of that process. We would like you to consider and uh respond when uh you feel ready to with your feelings on the possibilities of doing uh first of all, a rendezvous with the Syncom, and secondly, uh rendezvous with an associated EVA. We know that uh you're aware that the precise configuration of the satellite is uh somewhat unknown because we really don't understand exactly what the failure mode is. One of the possible failure modes is, I'm sure you're aware and probably the only one that you would have any insight into and that we would have any chance of doing anything about would be if the arming lever uh that should have extended when the satellite rolled out, did not do so for some reason. Uh, if the lever were hung up and you were successful in pulling it out, if the the decision to do that was made uh and it activated the sequence, then uh I'm sure you're aware of the timing that would occur after that. Uh, in 80 seconds, the antenna would deploy. In 6 and 1/2 minutes, the RCS would spin the satellite up. And 45 minutes, the PKM would fire. And all of that would have to be integrated into the planning in getting the orbiter away from the satellite. If you consider either the rendezvous or the rendezvous and an EVA to be feasible, we welcome any suggestions you folks would have on what a good approach would be and how it could possibly be carried out. But again, no plans have been made to do anything, and we really want your inputs uh into the management decision process so that uh a reasonable uh decision can be made. You stand by for a minute. We're back to you in a second. You bet. Houston, this is Discovery. Go ahead. Uh, certainly, we're we're more than uh we're ready to uh attempt the rendezvous. On the uh on the EVA, uh the breakdown would be uh Jeff and Dave would be the EVA crew members. Ray, who had an RMS training, would be the RMS operator uh, and uh John and I would try the rendezvous and I also am the uh the IV crew member. We've under we understand the comments you've made. We'd like to pass uh one thing back to you that you ought to also filter into your thinking. One other possibility might be to do it in one rendezvous activity and spend a couple of revs uh station-keeping to gain familiarity and get tuned up uh both for the flying task as well as the EVA folks in the payload bay. And we'd like you to consider that option as well. Okay, uh, uh, that sounds uh at least reasonable for planning for us, and we'll think about it some more, and I'm sure you will, too. Okay, that that's all we ask and, uh, sure are thinking about it, uh, and uh we'll we'll get you any opportunity to acknowledge it, that I'm sure we'd like to give it our our best try, so back to that and just making do. I think folks sure have been doing that, Don, and we're planning to ship up, uh, to you in a couple of hours. The rendezvous procedures first. Well, you can see we're having uh lots of fun up here, trying to figure out what happens to the human body in zero G. I can certainly remember reading studies for the last few days. And today the electrodes on my head are to do with electro-encephalography in order to look at the brain waves and see what effect there is there. Also done electrocardiogram today, which is electric pulse display, and I've well as good old bowel movements for Bill Pogue. Dr. Ray has fixed my heart with ultrasound to uh give me a sound wave of what my heart is doing. This is my heart. I've been running on it for a long time as well, as for years. So, we're hopeful that uh all of these electrodes and wires coming out of me will uh provide a big boost to the puzzle for uh space motion sickness that many people are working on. So, it's great to be up here and I'll now turn you over to uh Charlie. Yeah, electrophoresis in space today, the the flow electrophoresis which we've done several times before. In this chamber, we're creating samples material, which you see our own stuff computer we're interested in, uh purifying for future pharmaceutical use. That's some ways down the road yet, we're still developing the equipment. And we're still processing the hormones that must be tested for food and drug administration approval, and that's some way on down the line, but we're coming along very nicely. The activities include not only the separation of the substances in the chamber, as it is flowing, continuously, from bottom to top, or is that from top to bottom, I don't know the exact counts, but empty outlet, I can, uh, test for the presence of various materials by retrieving samples with syringe, and I even have a chemistry set, which tells me when the hormone is present and when I've successfully, uh, collecting it. Right now, I have an assay ongoing, transferring fluids from various containers to other containers, actually for mixing, when we occasionally, bottle it up with a kit with we'll sell products out of that hormone. I'm monitoring the contaminants being handled to ensure that that will look for the presence of contaminated uh bacteria. It is all a part to us that uh there be no bacteriological, uh, contamination, no micro, uh, falling up the process for us. And we're well along on those tests, so those are standard things that are very clear on this particular experiment on this flight. Okay, this is a demonstration, uh, the American flight echo experiment, that I've been doing on several crew members. Uh, Jeff is my subject here. You can see the light card on for uh his new electrocardiograph, which has a belt that's a sensor to the locker that I'll fix about around my waist, the whole thing on, and one difference that we have in in zero G. I'm taking his blood pressure, which is important to uh to let us know the resistance uh uh the peripheral flow, and everyone is looking there, and we do that with just a normal blood pressure cuff and stethoscope. The machine that I'll be moving to is the echo machine. Uh, I have a view of uh uh Jeff's heart through it. The transducer itself emits sound waves and it also picks up the the echo of the sound waves uh, and produces a picture on the screen for me. What we're trying to do with this experiment is see differences in uh the size of the heart and its chambers, and the differences in volume that we see throughout the flight. Uh, it's a little bit different uh in flight than it is on the ground because the heart appears to be in a slightly different position, so we have to sort of hunt around for it uh when we get up here. And I've been able to do this experiment on myself and also on three other crew members while we've set here, and all three hearts look just beautiful. We copy that rate. It's good to hear that everything's going so well. Of course you really deserve it. Those hearts are in the right place. The heart of America's space program, shuttle echocardiography. Discovery, Houston with you two teachers. Okay, Houston, we uh just finished dinner. We're uh forming a bias of Texas Ruby Red right now, and uh Ray is just lit a cigar. All right, sounds like you're just in time for the bedtime story, then. And if you're ready to copy, I'll try and give you a rundown of uh of the status and what we're looking at for future events. Okay, we're ready to copy. We've continued to do a failure mode analysis on the most likely failure mode uh of the syncom and the results to date have led us to believe that the most likely failure is as we have said all along, is in that activation lever. The plan now is to go ahead and do a rendezvous and photographic inspection. And we'll plan to do that on Tuesday, flight day 5, in addition we'll continue to evaluate options to try and activate that uh trip lever, the switch. We are not ruling out uh an EVA as a possibility. Uh one of the possibilities that we're uh considering is that uh although it's still unknown, the lever, the trip lever may actually be halfway deployed, in which case uh putting some type of a implement on the end of the RMS and actually just flipping it open with the end of the RMS may be sufficient. Roger, we understand. The EVA on Tuesday could conceivably attach a fly swatter device that's uh being developed from uh materials available in the cabin uh to actually uh attach to the end of the mechanical arm and snag the switch as it goes by on the slowly rotating syncom satellite. Discovery, Houston, the Orbit One team with your teachers. Admiral, happy uh April 15th to you guys. If you guys are still working on your income tax, don't forget to file it off over the states this morning. I'll show you a little bit of uh the toys that we've been uh working with, are you ready? We're all set, Corey and Bob. Here I am with the top. But this this one is not spinning. You can see how it tumbles when you touch it. And now, I'll try to spin it. Uh if you don't hold it down, however, it's rather difficult due to zero gravity, so holding it down, you can get the top to spin up rather well. Now, once it's spun up, it'll uh demonstrate its gyroscopic stability. It won't tumble now when I touch it, it'll just move translationally. And here's the uh first uh and probably the last, yo-yo show in space. Coming up, probably the only kind that will ever be demonstrated. Shooting the moon at 2,500 ft. per second. Looks like a lot of fun, how much practice did that take? Here we go with the demonstration of the Sky Rocket. All right, how about that? Here's the uh little weelo, and uh you can actually get it started uh using the centripetal force. Once it does get started, if you let go, it has enough force generated for it to uh take off with its own dynamics. Any smiles on our faces are just stimulated, you realize. There we go, a perfect joining up. Uh, we understand, we know you're not having any fun. Of course not. They said juggling in space was going to be different. It was slightly different than what you see on Earth. So paddle ball behaves uh quite a lot like it does uh in one G, except when you let go. They've been playing with the jacks and the the biggest problem is to keep your jacks from uh floating all over the cabin, while you're chasing the ball. Ball bounces the same way it does on Earth, uh but of course the jacks tumble in every direction if you happen to hit one. The Slinky, oddly enough, is in in most ways uh acts the same way here as it does. It's kind of interesting to let it go. Of course, that's something that doesn't do. It really it won't slink at all. It sort of droops over, but it's uh we have not been able to make it slink at all. Well, you can see the paper airplane has been attached to me. It just flies uh very much as it does on Earth, except much more slowly and much easier. Well, they're going to try to get this stuff on film as well so that it'll give you for uh children to demonstrate some of these physical properties of flight in space. Discovery, Houston. All right, Houston. The mission management team has just uh completed a meeting here, and they've decided that uh you will be go for an EVA tomorrow, and a rendezvous on the day after tomorrow, and uh we have a camp update uh teleprinter message that will be coming up to you at Guam, which will explain more of the activities for the rest of the day after lunch. Okay, we'll look forward to that. EVA tomorrow, rendezvous day after. This is Mission Control. Again, the decision made this morning to uh attempt to repair the Syncom, doing a space walk on uh Tuesday, that's tomorrow. There are uh two uh two potential uh tools that could be fabricated for the crew to attach to the RMS and effector, and those would be uh put together in the uh uh crew cabin most likely, and carried outside and attached to the end effector of the RMS. Uh the rendezvous would be completed on Wednesday, seated at the Capcom Console is uh Bob Crippen, a veteran astronaut who's flown too, rendezvous missions. He's discussing with the crew the rendezvous timeline and some other paperwork that was set up to them yesterday on the teleprinter. Okay, by crew, let me go, everybody. Okay, fine. Looks like we did get the swatter instruction. Copy. Okay, I guess that's all. Uh we'll read over the uh the procedures for making the fly swatter, and uh we'll talk to you at a later time. Message set up to the crew uh gave a list of uh materials and tools needed that includes five flight data file uh plastic covers, a Swiss army knife, gray and silver tape, a swivel stick, uh scissors, a bone saw, and a vacuum cleaner. All of these are items that are found in the spacecraft. The swivel stick is a uh metal uh uh pole to which the uh pieces of plastic will be taped and uh attached. And uh the that whole arrangement will be attached attached to the RMS during the EVA tomorrow. The RMS in turn on Wednesday would then be used to try to pull open that activation lever on the Syncom. Yeah, we've uh started making the fly swatter, and uh because of the short notice we had to use the orthopedics, orthopedics, we had to see as we just amputated the pusher end of the mechanical sync. Roger that. I hope the uh operation is a success. Well, I believe the patient is already dead. You can tell from this, they say it's uh a lot more fun than listening to down town. The crew is engaged in building a variety of fly swatting devices as they are being called. Mission specialist Jeff Hoffman uh coined a phrase that may be used again which is uh calling the crew the swat team so that they are uh in the business of uh putting together the second uh swatter as well. Okay, uh mod 3 on the uh fly swatter operations. Lacrosse stick sounds better, so we'll call this one the lacrosse stick ops. Okay, this is the some flight. First, we had toys in space and now it's been all afternoon doing arts and craft. You guys, you got everything for it. Yeah, we advance to watercolors tomorrow, so get ready. Okay. Roger, uh a little data on the uh tools. Uh we found that uh dependent on temperature that the flight data film file materials when pull tested broke at uh arrangement of 8 to 28 pounds. The uh wire wrap broke at a range of 17 to 32 pounds. Do the job, we need 2 to 10 pounds. So, we're in really good shape there. The uh any of the tools should hold up. Okay, so you figure they should break before the RMS back drive. That's affirmative, and they should hold up uh long enough to do the job. Okay, that looks good. You reckon those guys on the ground are jealous and look so much nicer than ours? We had a lot of practice in arts and crafts that uh summer camp. Well, you did good. Mission control, you sound busy. Any unusual day in space is now winding down. Oh, Roger. Sorry to interrupt your uh meal, but uh we thought it was kind of important uh we caucus a little bit more down here and uh we propose that we uh significantly extend your day somewhat already that we uh uh plan on waking you up an hour later tomorrow morning. We accept the secret ballot, we heartly agree with you. Okay, uh it's all seconded and approved. You got it. Oh, uh hold up, hold up. This emergency meeting of the International Rescue Aid Society is now in session. Delegates, hands over hearts. The air see me, let's rescue raise of Zion keep head so light as the sky. You mean everything to me. In a jam, in a stick, can you think no escape. Got to you to be here to rescue us, how we can. In a set, we mean every Let's you save society. Let the fly swat touch the sky. Our heart beats for the. Good morning Discovery. Houston here. Up and aboard to you I call, letting the pro dab a a patch to fix the slide to you. You're now members of the rescuers aid society. Not just yet. Maybe in a couple of days. We are now waking up, getting ready for a busy day, including a spacewalk this morning. Mission specialists, Dave Griggs and Jeff Hoffman, down in the airlock area getting into their suits, getting ready for the EVA. pressure 151 over 150. 153 over 151. Okay, copy. Let's see first. Okay, taking the air lock pressure down to zero before they step outside. Mission specialist, Ray Seddon has already positioned the arm in place to enable the crewmen to work off that side holding onto the hand rails for support and positioning themselves while they work on attaching the fly swatter tools to the RMS. Hey, pull it right there, that's great. Go. Roger. Are you out of your 801? Now, clear, yeah. 82, Jay. Audi, we got a good picture of you. Okay, thanks. Mission Control Houston. Mission Specialists, Jeff Hoffman, EV1, and Mission Specialist, Dave Griggs, EV2, are already out in the cargo bay. They have retrieved the fly swatter tools that were devised and built by the crew last night. They have those and moving down to attach them to the end effector of the mechanical arm. I am working on the and we're looking to take note of that what's that operation? About to use. Bad one. They don't fit right now when you don't have a window frame around it. Like figure out. Yeah. I think uh I think it's okay to press forward with what you got now and if it doesn't look stable enough we'll put another PRD on. How does that sound? Yeah. That sounds okay. Okay, I'm going to leave the cross stick tethered up to the fly swatter. I don't have a fly swat tether from the CRD down. Okay. Discovery, crossing over Baja, California at the present time. We've got the tethered line. Put the tether right around the And fly over. Okay, take a real check up before I let go. I don't think we can fly over that and can't fly over the other. Okay, the fly swatter is in the uh, top the end effector. That looks good, yeah. Okay, stay put. I'll go back and keep the cross stick. And uh, let me see. Put the small hole for the uh, cross stick that we let the water load loop. Into the, towards the end effector, is that correct? That's affirmative. We want that side against the can. All right. Hey, Jay, I'm just putting it on in the off arm. Got that set. Let me orient this, right? Hoffman now tightening up the uh, payload retention device. That's, that's good. That's beautiful. It's on that. Beautiful. It will be fixed up when that field is. It's tight. That looks pretty good from down here, you know? It will be fixed up. All right, then. We'll call it a day. Mission Control, Houston. Mission Specialists, Jeff Hoffman and Dave Griggs have successfully completed their task of attaching the fly swatter devices to the end of the orbiter manipulator system. We are ready to take them off for the elbow camera. Roger. Okay. Here we go. And Discovery, Houston, you just got a round of applause. Thanks for the work. Hey, you're welcome. Later today we anticipate uh, some tests with the robot arm. Mission Specialist, Ray Seddon after the uh, FCS checkout will unlimber the arm and run through the uh, different points at which uh, down here on the ground, we believe the arm will need to be at for the proper configuration for tomorrow's rendezvous. And then uh, attempt to repair of the Syncom satellite. Uh, Sally Ride, who is an accomplished arm operator, and has followed a couple of previous shuttle missions will be over here, in Mission Control Center to uh, talk to Ray Seddon about some of the things she's learned in the many uh, tests they've done over in the manipulator development facility here at JSC. You'll hear the uh, dulcet tones of Dr. Ride here in just a minute. Dr. R, thanks so much for the remarks. Thank you, Ray. And Ray, just to let you know that we're looking out for you down here. When Bob uh, called you a seamstress yesterday, we corrected him and told him that was a surgeon. Hey! Okay. The first thing to emphasize, I guess, about the RMS uh, job that you've got is that you're not actually going to be tracking and trying to grab the lever. I understand. And we think that uh, Bo will probably try and put the satellite uh, at roughly the right height and roughly the location, so that uh, from the poised position of the arm, you'll probably, you ought to be able to see the uh, the lever as it goes past you. The primary swatter, the one that we're planning for you to use and that we are assuming will work, is the one that's mounted on top of the end effector, up on the, the top by the camera. I understand that the fly swatter is the primary and the lacrosse stick is the backup. That's right. And the idea will be just to let the fly swatter drag on the satellite and the swatter ought to catch the lever, move it to the uh, proper position and then tear away, and you won't have to move the arm during uh, during any part of that operation once it once it touches the satellite. So, it's best to leave it there, let it take your best shot, uh, let the lever rotate by and the, the swatter will either catch the lever or it won't. If it doesn't catch, just back the arm away and readjust your view and just go in and try it again. And you should have time to do this uh, oh, between five and eight times with a 10-minute window and we're still negotiating the window. Understand that, the primary swatter uh, rips without tripping the lever. Then we'd like you to uh, activate the lacrosse stick and do that by uh, rolling the wrist 180 degrees. That will make that one, the lacrosse stick, the uh, the leading device on the wrist. Okay, we uh, appreciate all the good diagrams that have been coming up, they really helped and uh, let's get some sort of award in creative design of uh, or creative use of the tool center. By the way, thanks a lot for the help. Thank you for the good job you guys are all doing up there. Discovery, Houston, the rendezvous team's with you at through tethers. Good morning, rendezvous team. Uh, and I advise you to speak up at this hour. Well, we can hardly wait. We're uh, looking forward to successful completion of phase two. You guys did a terrific job yesterday. Well, thank you. Uh, we'll see what happens today. Mission Control, Houston, NC3 burn up coming. That'll be a 12.1 foot per second burn sending Discovery toward uh, Syncom. The NC3 burn actually will slow the orbiter down so that it descends to uh, the same uh, altitude as Syncom, and the uh, reverse psychology of orbital rendezvous dynamics will uh, essentially speed up relative to Syncom because it will be in a lower orbit around the earth. Roger that, and we've got the uh, bird, and uh, we got our radar lock on where it is. And uh, we're doing uh, block number 14. Ultrasonics good. Copy that, you've been watching. Uh, we are starting maneuver for the terminal. Yeah, I heard it about the same altitude as the Syncom, and approximately eight miles behind. Mission Control, Houston, the Elms burn complete, and uh, all indications are very good. As we went L-O-S, uh, we had indications from the RNU officer that the arm uh, of the orbital Discovery has been positioned in a station-keeping attitude. Pilot Don Williams reported tally-ho to target, which we took to mean they have uh, uh, visual of the target. It was giving us the right uh, tally-ho on the target and it is right in the middle of our cross. Outstanding. See the lever yet? Looking at it. See if they are trying to spin. Discovery, we've got a spin rate on Syncom uh, it's just about 36 seconds. Okay, thanks a lot. That's about a 2.6 RPM spin rate. Okay, we're about 180 ft away, maybe 175. Roger, we see that. And also uh, we're all curious down here, you uh, recorded the Tally-Ho and the uh, lever. Can you give us some kind of estimate on its position, whether or not it's fully extended? It is definitely not in the launch position. Uh, you cannot confirm whether it's fully extended, but it looks like it's pretty near to the perpendicular. Uh, I'm not sure whether that's what you want to hear. Uh, I have not found an operations record with that, regardless of the position. Is that correct? That's affirmative. Okay, copy. Got you, Houston. Is it just the gear floating on our right over the cargo bay this night? Discovery, Houston, going to LOS, Guam. See you in Hawaii in 3-4 and congratulations on a great rendezvous. Your fuel figures were outstanding. Okay, thanks. Uh, of course, just you guys, but we're looking forward to it. We'll try to get to TV in Hawaii. Mission Control, Houston, now 13 minutes and about 10 seconds prior to the opening of the 60-second window, in which uh, attempts will be made to uh, try to snag the latch of the activation lever on Syncom. And within the window uh, Cart County up to six minutes. We now have contact against the Syncom. We can see the reflection wave. The fly swatter device is being deflected by the spin of the uh, Syncom satellite. I'm moving in again now for another attempt. Okay, look wrong on the uh, fly swatter. Fly swatters again are designed to break away uh, with a certain amount of force applied. Mission Control, Houston, just about a minute left in this window. Arm moving in again towards Syncom. Discovery, Houston, the window is closed. We're on the 7th. We copy. Uh, we estimate we got a hard physical contact on at least two occasions. And we concur with that, that was a great job. Okay, looking at the fly swatter, the bottom run of the fly swatter is broken. Uh, we also hit it with the base of the fly swatter. Roger, you did everything you possibly could and uh, we had a good view of that, the procedural during that time on the C-U-B and the it was a, a great job. Mission Control, Houston, T plus 5 days, 0 hours, 30 minutes. Discovery is moving away from the Syncom satellite. The uh, sequence of events uh, that were uh, to be used as a timing reference uh, with activation of the host injection sequencer uh, would be deployed from the antenna in 80 seconds. Spin up of the satellite within six minutes. Firing of the uh, perigee kick motor within uh, 45 minutes. Houston, uh, we have to report the Omni never did come up and the spin rate is still less than 2 RPM. Okay. It's climbing down at 1 RPM. The window has closed. The flight rules uh, which called for uh, hard contact and then separation have been followed. The orbiter has separated from Syncom. There will be no further attempts to uh, try to trip the lever with the fly swatter devices on the end effector. We got some words relative to landing when you're ready to listen. Okay. Okay, uh, either Thursday or Friday is optional with this, the weather's not a factor. And we have no problems if you prefer to land on Friday. We have the status to stay up for an extra day. Uh, however, if there's uh, a desire you know, to get us down, we can most likely get the uh, orbiter stored if we hop to it right now. Well, we're getting you the choice. We'll stay up. Somehow, I knew you might say that. Roger, you can uh, tell Mr. Sean Hamburg from Seward, Nebraska that his uh, corn is growing beautifully up here in space. And after having a You bet, Dan. A few moments ago we changed the main course of our dinner tonight. I guess the appropriate response would be all shucks. Well, that's a little corny. I think we've already acknowledged the tremendous job you've uh, you've done. Certainly all of us here on the uh flight team recognized that. We've got a a couple other notes. Uh Richard Truly, he sends his personal best and uh, I'll just read to you an entire Naval Space Command. I applaud your outstanding efforts, your attempt today to correct the difficulty with the SAT. Your flawless execution of EVA, the rendezvous and repair attempts, were matched only by Houston's great flight support the nation has come to expect from the space shuttle. Have a safe trip home, the navy thanks you all, signed Richard. Well, we certainly appreciate that from Dan and uh, you know we're as interested as anyone, you sure those navy telemetry folks are We got the free special uh people on the recovery team up there. Well, we sure all appreciate that and just as another uh, follow up note on that, uh we were all watching the press conference uh that occurred just after the uh, the rendezvous and the work that you did with the satellite and the President of uh Hughes Communication was very explicit and and very congratulatory in his remarks about the tremendous job that you've done and it was a 100% unqualified successful effort on your part to to do all that you possibly could and uh he really was uh thankful and grateful of all the work that you've done. You'll have some well-rested dreams now. All right, and goodnight. You know I know everybody in the crew has said it before, but we certainly appreciate all the effort that you folks do there at at the control and at the rest of the and all of our offer to us and trying to get that that life fixed. Discovery Houston PAO, we're ready to start this news conference now. Or Senator Garn, now that you've had a taste of space flight, which you, which would you rather be, a United States senator, or a working astronaut? Gee, that's one of the easiest questions I've ever had to answer. If I were about 10 years younger, I'd choose the work in the astronaut over being a senator so fast, it would make your head swim. I've got a question for Charlie Walker. Uh Charlie, part of the emphasis of this flight has been for you to check for contamination in your biological sample, and that involves some innovative uh test hardware to incubate those tests. How did those tests go? Well, uh Craig, the answer is uh, the test has been going well. That is uh, I've had no indication of either microbial growth uh at the levels that we're able to monitor, which are very low levels, that is well below uh acceptable maximum limits. And um, the uh, and no endotoxin by-products, either. So the contamination problem appears not to be with us this mission. Senator Garn, you said that it was important for um, NASA, that you do the Space Adaptation Syndrome studies, so that you could bring back specific information. Did you get sick, sir? Yes, I did. I told you I'd report that, and fortunately, like most of the reports that if you take medication, you're over it in 2 days, and if you don't, you're over it in 2 days. And I'll be very honest with you. I didn't feel good for 2 days, but I sure felt fine since. It's been a wonderful experience. Absolutely fantastic. I'm sorry we have to come down tomorrow. I'm glad we got to stay 2 days longer, and I wish we could figure out some way to stay up longer. This is great stuff, I'd love this. I'd love to show you how I can do everything that Mary Lou Retton can do up here. On the next orbit, as Discovery comes around the Earth, it passes over the Milot tracking station, she will talk to her sister ship the Challenger, which is on the pad at the Kennedy Space Center, uh preparing for the 51B mission. This will be the first time that two American spacecraft have talked to one another since the days of Apollo. The last time two American ships in orbit talked to one another was the Gemini 6 and 7 rendezvous mission. Challenger Discovery on UHF, how do you read? Discovery, Challenger, we read you loud and clear, how me? Hello Bob, we read you, weak but clear. We were passing by, we thought we'd just give you a call, see how you read us. Challenger Discovery, we're going out of range. Good luck, and well see you uh back on the ground. Roger, Bob. Good. Greeting. Good morning, Mr. President. Ah, thank you. I was I thought maybe I might have missed you. Well, Richard, we know you had some frustrations up there, but overall, I think we can all be proud of the fourth mission of the Discovery, and all that you've accomplished. We've been watching down here on 90 million all of America, and I want you to know that we're rooting for you all. We saw a lot of human ingenuity at work, making the fly swatter-like tool, and then we watched Jeff Hoffman on the Dave Grigsby install it on the Discovery's arm. We had to acknowledge that was great work, and we're calling all of you up there now the SWAT team. I want to congratulate astronauts Bob Ko, and all of the maneuvers you've been putting the shuttle through, and the fix to the shuttle to go up, and we're learning more about its versatility every trip. I've seen I've seen you playing excuse me. I mean the demonstrating with balls and jacks and yo-yos and even a slinky toy in the zero gravity of space. I know you're doing this to make some educational video tapes for students learning about the laws of physics. That's really the best thing about our space program, the inspiration and challenge it gives our our young people. You've been conducting extensive tests on the human body, blood flow and digestion, and I want to ask astronaut physician Ray Seddon how are these tests working out? And Ray, I'd also like to commend you on your dexterity in getting that pin on the side of the satellite. I can, if you don't mind, I can think of a job on a ranch in California that you might be interested in. Senator Garn, I know that you're taking part in the health experiments, and Jake, how are you doing? You, you're doing a fine job up there, but I could use your help down here right now in getting the federal budget under control and arranging assistance for some people fighting for their freedom in Central America, so don't stay up there too long. Jake, maybe in around that's wonderful. I'm doing just great. I missed you, but I'll be back on Tuesday. I am well aware of the vote on the Nicaraguan aid on Tuesday night, and I'll be voting just the way you'd like me to when I get back. Well, God bless you. And you know Jake, maybe in around four years or so, uh you could use your influence with NASA to uh get a certain retired politician a ride on the Space Shuttle. But I just want all of you to know how proud we are of you. Good luck and God be with all of you. Thank you very much, Mr. President. We certainly enjoy being here, and I'm sure you realize that we're just the people in the space, uh, who are at the working edge of a great team that's on the ground supporting us. Thanks again. Well, you're a great team up there and we're all very proud of you. God bless you. Jeff, the uh entry team is with you and we're looking forward to watching you come all the way back to KSC this morning. Okay, we'll do a good week. Discovery, Houston. Go ahead, Houston. Roger Bob, I don't know if you can make a pirate on your last uh pass over the Cape, but uh the note we had on your interest summary message concerning rain showers is uh is the problem down at the Cape currently. As such uh, we're going to go ahead and no go uh this rev, wait a rev and uh try to take advantage of our second opportunity into the Cape. Roger, no go, and we're 22 hours, 45 minutes and 20 seconds for our next try. This is the Kennedy Space Center where we're waiting for the landing of Discovery after an exciting mission. We have had some rain showers off either end of the runway, uh today. This is expected to dissipate uh fairly rapidly, so that we will be ready for a landing on the next rev uh at 8:54 Eastern Time. Discovery, Houston. Go ahead, Houston. Roger Bob, uh looks like waiting a rev uh paid off for weather. As such, uh you've got a go from us for the deorbit burn. Roger, we copy, go for deorbit burn. Well the system's now burning. Pulse and officer reports good data coming through and uh a good burn underway. All right, correct, it's not over. Nominal burn. Thank you. Mission Control, Houston, uh, the ground station here at Johnson Space Center will attempt to punch through the plasma wave that uh Discovery will be traveling through during its blackout and take data and also perhaps voice communication. Discovery will be traveling at a speed of Mach 17 at that time. It's only been done once before on uh, the 51A reentry, that was accomplished. Discovery, Houston with you through JSE. Roger, Houston, we read you loud and clear. Louder and clear also. Houston, it looks like we may not be talking at all. You know we need a sunroof on this building so we can watch it. Now passing out over Louisiana over the Gulf of Mexico headed in toward runway 33 at the Kennedy Space Center. Discovery still hypersonic at 5.9, range 177 nautical miles, approaching the coast of Florida. Discovery's range now 25 nautical miles from the runway, for velocity 938 feet per second, altitude 45,000 feet. Commander Bob Ko now executing the right overhead turn onto runway 33. Altitude 27,000 feet, range 14.8 nautical miles. Discovery descending at 193 feet per second. Her estimated speed at touchdown, 195 knots. Mido reports we're looking good rolling on the final. Discovery now processing the microwave landing system at Kennedy Space Center. Discovery, Houston, show you on glide slope converging to center line, surface wind 090 at 9. Roger that. Now 4 nautical miles out. Altitude 1,800 feet, now 1,500 feet, 1,200. 1.5 nautical miles out, 434 feet. 265 feet. 265 feet, 116 feet, 75, 45, gear down and locked. Touchdown. That was gear descending now. Touchdown. Mission Control Houston has mission elapsed time of 6 days, 23 hours, 56 minutes. The SWAT team is home. Discovery this is ground work commander. Uh, I think you blew our right hand out for all time. Roger. Commander Bob Ko, uh landing exactly on the center line here at the Kennedy Space Center. Despite the problem with the tire, the uh tread on the tire appears to have been uh split partially away, which uh could have uh occurred during the the braking. This is the first time that we have had three shuttle orbiters in flow for launch at the Kennedy Space Center. Atlantis presently in the orbiter processing facility. Challenger is on the pad and ready for launch just 10 days from today at 12 noon. Here at the Kennedy Space Center, the stair step and the uh portable white room has been moved into place on the side of the orbiter and the uh hatch uh being opened. Mission Control Houston, the crew is departing the orbiter now. Okay, Dan, and we'll see you back in Houston. Thanks, sir, good work. Good work to you guys.