Space Shuttle Robot Makes Catch of the Day

NASA rewarded the Columbia astronauts’ energy-conservation efforts by adding a day to their mission, and a shuttle robot scored a space first Sunday, catching a floating object on command.

The seven astronauts had been working in near darkness, curtailing television views of the shuttle and turning off unnecessary computers to save energy.

The shuttle is now scheduled to land here Thursday.

German researchers said the 2 1/2-foot-long robot arm succeeded in clamping onto a floating aluminum die not quite an inch in size.