Spacewalkers out to free jammed solar panel:Recent Lnch Rep.

[Anonymous]

Houston, Dec. 19 (AP): Two spacewalking astronauts finished folding up a stubborn, accordion-like solar panel that was stuck on the international space station, resolving the only complication in space shuttle Discovery's otherwise smooth mission. <br /><br />Shuttle astronauts Robert Curbeam and Christer Fuglesang, a Swede from the European Space Agency, managed to get the last section of the 115-foot (34.5-meter) array folded into a box about five hours into the spacewalk. It was the fourth venture outside for Discovery's astronauts during their visit to the orbiting outpost. <br /><br />Workers in Mission Control applauded when the final section fell into the box. But Curbeam radioed back that a wire was still loose. About 30 minutes later, he managed to get it rolled up and the box latched. <br /><br />``Great job by everybody up there and everyone on the ground here,'' Mission Control said. <br /><br />The pair used a scraper to try to get the array unstuck, shook the panel and used pliers to tighten the wire that folds it up. It was a stop-and-go process with astronauts inside the space station repeatedly sending remote-controlled commands to fold up the array. <br /><br />The addition of Monday's impromptu spacewalk forced NASA to delay Discovery's return home by a day to Friday. <br /><br />The electricity-generating array became stuck Wednesday in the halfway-retracted position as it was being folded up by remote control. After repeated efforts to get it to retract _ including attempts to shake it loose by having an astronaut exercise vigorously aboard the space station _ NASA decided to send two cosmic mechanics out to fix it. <br /><br />It was Curbeam's fourth spacewalk of the mission, the most by any astronaut during a single shuttle flight. <br /><br />The array was part of the space station's temporary power source. The space agency had to retract it to make room for a newly installed array that will be part of the space station's permanent power source. <br /><br />Th <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <strong><font size="2"><p align="center"><br /><img id="a9529085-d63d-481e-9277-832ea5d58917" src="http://sitelife.space.com/ver1.0/Content/images/store/9/2/a9529085-d63d-481e-9277-832ea5d58917.Large.gif" alt="blog post photo" /><br /><font color="#339966">Oops! this is my alien friend.</font></p><p align="center"><font color="#ff6600">╬→Ť╠╣є ’ M€ ’<br />╬→ Ðôŵņ2Ëãřŧĥ ๑<br />╬→ ЙДm€ :Varsha<br /></font></p></font></strong> </div>

 

[shiva_enigma]

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[bobw]

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[mrmorris]

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[bobw]

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[telfrow]

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