14 DAY TRIAL // Officials at the American space agency announce that they have decided to launch the space shuttle Atlantis on May 14. The mission will represent the final flight the aging orbiter will perform. After the STS-132 trek is completed, only two additional missions, by the shuttles Discovery and Endeavor, are scheduled to take place, in September and November respectively. Atlantis will take-off to the International Space Station (ISS) at 2:20 pm EDT (1820 GMT) next Friday, from the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Cape Canaveral, Florida.
“We're ready to go next Friday. It's been 15 days since we last landed, nine days until we launch. This is the kind of pace that this team thrives on,” John Shannon, who is the chief of the NASA space shuttle program, told reporters yesterday. He reminded that the primary cargo of STS-132 would be the Russian-built Mini-Research Module 1 (MRM1), which is also known as Rassvet. The assembly will be primarily used to store various types of cargo, but it can also serve as a docking port for visiting spacecraft. This represents one of the final additions that the Russian Federal Space Agency (RosCosmos) will make to the orbital facility.
STS-132 is scheduled to last for 12 days, during which time three spacewalks are planned. The mission is to successfully install and commission the new module. In addition to this primary task, astronauts will also need to replace a number of old solar array batteries, as well deliver critical spare parts to the station. Some work on the external maintenance robot Dextre is also planned. This machine is in charge of conducted various chores on the outer hull of the ISS, that are too small to be done using the larger Canadarm-2 robotic device. “This flight has a little bit of everything,” Shannon said of Atlantis' mission.
According to the specifications for Rassvet, the module is 7 meters (23 feet) in length, has a cylindrical shape, and features a small airlock that can be used for installing and removing scientific experiments from the outer hull of the station. The entire structure will eventually be affixed to the Russian Zarya control module, on one of its Earth-facing berths. Another possible use for the 17,147-pound (7,777-kilogram) apparatus will be as a science laboratory, if astronauts can find a way to manage the way in which cargo is loaded inside, Space reports.