Shuttle Delivers Robot Arm to Space Station

Space shuttle Endeavour and its crew pulled up to the international space station Saturday, bringing a giant billion-dollar robot arm that is needed to finish building the orbiting skyscraper.

Cmdr. Kent Rominger took his time as he steered Endeavour in for the docking, which occurred a half-hour later than planned. A radio problem prevented the two crews from talking with one another during the operation, and Mission Control had to relay all the messages until a better link was established.

Rominger joked with space station astronaut Jim Voss about the problem. “We’ve got to keep our sense of humor,” Voss agreed, chuckling.

The two spacecraft came together 240 miles above the South Pacific, ending a two-day chase that began with Endeavour’s liftoff.

“Terrific job, Endeavour,” radioed Mission Control.

The seven shuttle astronauts are the first visitors for the three space station residents, who moved in last month. They will have to wait until Monday to exchange handshakes and hugs because of the different cabin pressures between the spacecraft.

On Saturday, the two crews had to settle for waving to one another from opposite sides of a porthole. All the shuttle astronauts jammed into an outer space station compartment to peek inside the orbiting complex and leave behind items for later pickup by the station crew. One end of the compartment always remained sealed.

The shuttle astronauts needed a power tool from space station Alpha for today’s spacewalk to install the new robot arm, and the station residents were eager to get letters from home, fresh fruit and water, and electrical cords needed to operate the new arm.

Today was expected to be a big day not only for the 10 space travelers but for the Canadian Space Agency, which supplied the arm.

This morning, Endeavour’s crew will remove the new robot arm from the shuttle payload bay and attach it to the complex using the shuttle’s old robot arm. The new arm will remain folded until it’s latched onto the space station, then a pair of spacewalking astronauts will pull it out to its full 58 feet and wire it up.