14 DAY TRIAL // With only 4 days to go until the last launch in the American Space Shuttle Program (SSP), the 4 astronauts that will make up Atlantis' crew have entered quarantine. The move is precautionary, meant to ensure that none of the spaceflyers gets sick right before launch.
STS-135 is the last mission ever to be flown by a space shuttle. Atlantis' sister spacecraft, Discovery and Endeavour, have already completed their final missions earlier this year, and are now being decommissioned from active use.
Atlantis will spend about 12 days in space, but its crew will perform no extravehicular activity during their stay at the International Space Station (ISS). The mission is focused exclusively on resupplying the orbital lab with as many spare parts, experiments and provisions as possible.
The crew entered quarantine on Friday, July 1, and will remain confined until they launch on July 8. NASA decided to attempt for a blast off at 11:25 am EDT (1526 GMT). The spacecraft will take off from the Launch Pad 39A facility at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC), in Florida.
These past few weeks have been hectic on the four astronauts, NASA officials explain. They had to attend numerous meetings, press briefings and public appearances, more so than other crews have had to. This interest stems from the fact that this is the last SSP mission.
“A lot of the focus has been on the fact that this is the historic final flight of the space shuttle. This is the right crew for the right time,” said STS-135 Commander Chris Ferguson on June 30.
The rest of his crew is made up of Pilot Douglas Hurley (second spaceflight), mission specialists Sandra Magnus (third mission) and flight engineer Rex Walheim (third spaceflight). This is also Ferguson's third mission, Space reports.
Thus far, tests conducted on Atlantis have revealed no problems of the type that plagued the launches of its two sister spacecraft. NASA is cautiously optimistic that everything will fall into place when the time to launch comes.
“We are as enormously proud of this vehicle. We tend to treat these vehicles as if they're a little part of us. To see them go away is like mourning a friend. They've been wonderful to us. There's an enormous amount of history to look back on,” Ferguson explains.
After the space shuttle returns home, it will join the rest of the retired space fleet. All three orbiters will then be decommissioned, and sent to their respective new homes, which NASA decided on earlier this year.
Endeavour will go to the California Science Center, in Los Angeles, while Discovery will be sent to the Smithsonian National and Air Space Museum. Atlantis will remain on display at the KSC Visitors Complex.