Space shuttle Endeavour undocked from the international space station a day early yesterday, as NASA kept a wary eye on Hurricane Dean.
Space agency managers worried that the storm would move toward Houston and force them to evacuate to a smaller-staffed makeshift control center at Cape Canaveral, Florida. The Endeavour crew prepared to land tomorrow as a precaution.
"Endeavour departed," space station commander Fyodor Yurchikhin said as ringing bells heralded the shuttle's parting, a tradition borrowed from the Navy.
"Thanks for everything, Scott and Endeavour crew," station resident Clay Anderson said to shuttle commander Scott Kelly. "Godspeed."
"We couldn't have gotten everything accomplished without you guys," Kelly replied. "We look forward to seeing you back on planet Earth."
The shuttle crew, which includes teacher-astronaut Barbara Morgan, had been at the orbiting outpost since August 10. In that time, they attached a new truss segment to the station, delivered cargo and replaced a failed gyroscope, which controls the station's orientation.
They have had to compress their schedule to get ready for the early undocking. Morgan, who was Christa McAuliffe's backup on the tragic 1986 Challenger mission, was scheduled to talk to students in Massachusetts yesterday but that chat was canceled.
A spacewalk on Saturday was shortened so the astronauts could wrap up their work at the station. During that jaunt, the spacewalkers saw the eye of the enormous hurricane swirling in the Caribbean and expressed their amazement at the sight.
The astronauts also skipped flying around the station after undocking to take pictures of the complex, an exercise NASA likes crews to do if the schedule and fuel supply permit.
Source: China Daily/agencies
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