Mission Accomplished

By Frederic Golden

Sally Ride and friends have the time of their lives

It was almost, but not quite, a perfect performance. As the early morning sun glinted off its wings, Challenger came swooping out of the skies like a giant California condor and touched softly down right on the runway's center line. "Great-looking landing," said Mission Control against a background of cheers and applause. About the only thing that marred the conclusion of the seventh shuttle mission, highlighted by the presence of the first American woman in space, was some damage to the shuttle's brakes and protective tiles. Yet Challenger's flight ended on a slightly disappointing note. Instead of landing on the new three-mile-long shuttle runway at Florida's Kennedy Space Center, the spacecraft was diverted at the last minute to California's sprawling Edwards Air Force Base. As Mission Control put it to the Challenger crew, there was some very cold beer waiting for them, except "it's 3,000 miles away."

The culprit, as Californians gleefully observed, was scuddy Florida weather. When it became apparent in the early hours of the morning on Challenger's sixth and last day in orbit that the sun would not burn away the morning fog and the winds would not chase away the low-hanging clouds over Cape Canaveral, Mission Control in Houston sent up the gloomy message: rather than attempt a first-ever shuttle landing at Kennedy, Challenger would put down on its next orbit (its 98th) on the dried-out lake bed in the Mojave Desert where shuttles have come home from space on five previous occasions. True to the Right Stuff test-pilot tradition from which he hails, Navy Captain Robert Crippen, 45, Challenger's commander and the only space veteran on board, acknowledged the decision with cool resignation. Said he: "Well, we would like to have gone in there very much, but if the weather's bad, that's not the right thing to do."

The eleventh-hour diversion showed, as President Reagan noted in a congratulatory postflight telephone chat with the Challenger crew, that for all of NASA's "miracles" in space, "no one can do anything about the weather." Reagan had hoped to be watching at the Kennedy Space Center and, as slightly cynical Washington political observers speculated, perhaps bolster his popularity among women voters by personally welcoming Sally Ride, 32, the pioneering U.S. woman space traveler, on her return. But he scrubbed his visit after indications grew that foul weather might interfere with the Florida landing; the White House explained that Reagan did not want his presence to be a factor in deciding when and where to bring down the spacecraft.

Clearly, NASA'S shuttle chief, Air Force Lieut. General James Abrahamson, badly wanted Challenger to land at Kennedy. By returning directly to its launch area, the shuttle might have cut at least a week off its turnaround time, the number of days it takes technicians to prepare the complex ship for another flight. Challenger now will have to be piggybacked by a NASA 747 to Florida, probably at the end of this week. According to Abrahamson, that will delay its next flight, originally scheduled for mid-August, by about eight days. Moreover, the space agency will probably not be able to try out its new concrete shuttle landing strip at Kennedy until early next year. Reason: Challenger's next flight involves both a nighttime lift-off and landing, while on the mission after that, a refurbished Columbia, NASA'S other operational shuttle, will return to orbit carrying the heaviest single cargo to date, the 34,500-lb. European-built space lab. NASA does not want to risk a landing on the relatively narrow, marsh-lined Kennedy runway during either mission.

Still, even though he was left sitting at fogbound Kennedy without his "bird," NASA Chief James Beggs could rightly take pride in a mission performed in what he called "almost flawless fashion." Abrahamson fully concurred, pointing out that Challenger accomplished 96% of its objectives and that there were far fewer "anomalies" than on any previous mission, only 21 by preliminary count. (There were 42 anomalies on the last shuttle flight, in April.) Two of these, however, played a part in the decision not to prolong the flight another day or so in hopes of homing in at Kennedy. They involved some brief, balky behavior by one of the shuttle's three auxiliary power units (APUs). The small engines provide the hydraulic pressure for operating the craft's landing gear, flap, braking rudder and other flight-control systems. The APUs have been troublesome on previous flights.

Certainly Mission Control had no problems with the five-member crew, the largest yet to fly on a shuttle. Barely a day after their flaming on-time liftoff, Crippen and company set out two commercial communications satellites, one Canadian, the other Indonesian. By week's end the satellites had completed their long six-day climbs to "geostationary" orbit 22,300 miles above the equator. "That's four for four," Ride announced proudly, tallying up the number of commercial satellites successfully launched by the shuttle so far.*

The Challenger crew members also activated an array of zero-g experiments, some, like a biological-materials separation test for making Pharmaceuticals, of potential commercial value. The space team acted as guinea pigs for Mission Specialist Norm Thagard, 39, the second medical doctor to fly the shuttle. He was trying to learn why some astronauts suffer from a form of queasiness known as space-adaptation syndrome during the initial hours of weightlessness. At the astronauts' request, Mission Control no longer publicly discusses medical problems during a flight. But judging by the demeanor of the five during television broadcasts from Challenger, none of the crew seemed to have had a nausea problem.

For the astronauts and just about everyone else, the mission's highlight came on the fifth day, when Ride and Air Force Colonel John Fabian, 44, began operating the shuttle's 50-ft.-long remote-controlled mechanical arm. As Challenger circled 181 miles above the earth, Ride called out commands, while Fabian punched buttons on a console at the rear of the shuttle cockpit, where they could look out into the cargo bay and watch the arm's slow, methodical movements. The arm gradually edged upward, reaching slowly over to the West German-built Shuttle Pallet Satellite, or SPAS. Looking like what one newspaper described as a flying bedstead, the complex $23 million package carried a TV camera and eight experiments, including remote-sensing instruments that measured the shuttle's effects on its immediate space environment and tests of techniques for processing materials at zero-g.

With eye-to-hand coordination that would be the envy of any Donkey Kong addict, Ride and Fabian grabbed hold of the satellite with a snarelike device at the far end of the mechanical arm. Gently, they lifted SPAS out of the cargo bay and left it adrift outside the ship. Since nothing falls of its own volition in space, the weightless satellite moved along with the shuttle. Though the motion was almost imperceptible, they were actually speeding at more than 17,000 m.p.h.

Wanting to make sure they would not lose the costly 3,300-lb. flying lab, the astronauts quickly snatched it back. Then with their confidence bolstered, they released it again for more free flight. This time Crippen fired up the shuttle's small maneuvering engines to edge Challenger around SPAS. Then he pulled ahead of it, putting about 1,000 ft. between the shuttle and the satellite. Said Crippen: "That SPAS is a nice-flying little vehicle." In fact, at one point, Challenger's exhaust gases sent the little vehicle spinning much faster than had been anticipated. Mission Controllers said that the surprise effect was something that NASA planners would have to take into account in future operations.

The astronauts retrieved and released the satellite five times in all. Even Dr. Thagard took a turn working the Canadian-built manipulator during one capture. But the most spectacular moment came when the satellite's television camera trained its eye on the orbiting shuttle. Drifting lazily against the background of the cloud-covered earth, Challenger looked like a giant extraterrestrial moth. The stunning pictures were the first public views of the shuttle in orbit. "Beautiful!" exulted Astronaut Guy Gardner in Mission Control. Replied Co-Pilot Rick Hauck, 42, from space: "You've got five very happy people up here." To which Gardner retorted: "There are several thousand happy people down here."

Though SPAS initially showed some signs of overheating, its instruments worked without a hitch while Challenger played tag with it. Finally, after it had been orbiting freely for more than six hours, it was hauled back aboard the shuttle and tucked safely away in the cargo bay for use on a future mission. Said a proud Crippen: "We've been told some crews in the past have announced, 'We deliver.' Well, for Flight 7, we pick up and deliver." Challenger's successful exercise was a rehearsal for a more difficult chore, scheduled for next year's 13th shuttle mission. The arm will be used to pluck an ailing $200 million astronomical research satellite known as the Solar Maximum Mission, or Solar Max for short, out of orbit. In a space first, the astronauts will try to repair Solar Max on the spot and then deploy it again. If their orbital tinkering fails, they will carry Solar Max back to earth. In either case, the operation would show skeptics, especially in Congress, that the shuttle is a useful tool for prolonging the lifetime of expensive satellites. It might also create enthusiasm for a more advanced vehicle called the space tug. Unlike the shuttle, which can travel only a few hundred miles above the earth, the tug could reach geostationary orbit, where most communications satellites are parked. So far, however, the tug is only a gleam in the eyes of NASA'S farsighted planners.

Though she resolutely tried to shun the limelight from the start of the mission, popular interest clearly was centered on Sally Ride. Reagan singled her out in his public telephone chat with the crew, saying she had won her seat because "you were the best person for the job." When her picture flashed back to earth during a TV broadcast from space, it showed a cheerful, scrub-faced young woman (Sally had pointedly refused to carry lipstick and other makeup in her personal kit). She seemed to be enjoying herself thoroughly as she cavorted with her four male companions in their zero-g world. Ride engaged in a contest to see which of the astronauts could float fastest in the cabin (Fabian won; Ride finished second) and helped retrieve jelly beans provided by the White House that were floating around the ship. She also got off some good one-liners. While working out on the spacecraft's treadmill during one pass around the earth, Ride commented, "I'm probably one of the few people to run across the Indian Ocean."

Ride had insisted prior to her Challenger mission that she be treated the same way as her male crewmates. During a homecoming reception at Johnson Space Center in Houston, where the astronauts were flown after their landing in California, Ride spurned a large bouquet of carnations and roses proffered to her by a NASA official.

Later, however, when she was seated inside the car that carried her away from the ceremonies, she did accept the flowers.

Perhaps because of Ride's presence, and psychologists surely will debate the question, the crew seemed more relaxed than on any earlier flight. Conversations flowed freely. There was less of the cryptic test-pilot terseness in their chatter. On Sunday, Ride and the three other space rookies aboard Challenger, all members of the 1978 class of astronauts, wore T shirts imprinted with their class initials TFNG (for Thirty-Five New Guys, even though six of the new guys happened to be women). While NASA'S doctors had yet to make a detailed examination of the biomedical data from the flight, every indication from Ride's performance pointed to the perfectly predictable conclusion that being a woman is no disability in space. Said Flight Director John Cox: "She showed that she's just as capable as any of the men." Said Ride: "I'm sure that it's the most fun I'll ever have in my life."

The next female astronaut scheduled to fly is Judith Resnik, 34, a Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Akron, who has a seat next March on the twelfth shuttle mission, along with Ride's husband, Astronaut Steven Hawley, 31. But NASA'S new ecumenical-crew policy goes beyond women. A mission specialist on the next Challenger flight will be Air Force Lieut. Colonel Guion Bluford, 40, who will become the first black astronaut in space.

--By Frederic Golden.

Reported by Jerry Hannifin/Houston and Joseph J. Kane/ Edwards Air Force Base

* The count did not include NASA's own $135 million Tracking and Data Relay Satellite (TDRS), which failed to reach geostationary orbit after its launch on Challenger's last flight. Technicians expect to nudge TDRS into proper orbit this week.

With reporting by Jerry Hannifin, Joseph J. Kane This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.