March 21, 2001 - After a surprising turnaround in the Florida weather, Discovery's astronauts -- and the first International Space Station residents -- returned home to Kennedy Space Center at 2:31 a.m. EST Wednesday. Entry Flight Director Wayne Hale made the a decision to land in Florida just before 1:00 a.m. EST after cloudy skies and gusty winds had cleared due to a low-pressure system that raced through the Shuttle Landing Facility area faster than expected Tuesday night.

STS-102 Commander Jim Wetherbee fired Space Shuttle Discovery's engines at 1:26 a.m. EST to begin the shuttle's descent. With assistance from Pilot Jim Kelly, he made a smooth landing on Runway 15, the 17th night landing in the shuttle program and the 12th night landing at Kennedy. The shuttle had traveled a total of 5,357,762 statute miles.

Wetherbee, Kelly and Mission Specialists Paul Richards and Andy Thomas had spent a total of 12 days, 19 hours, 49 minutes on orbit. They had conducted a successful rendezvous and docking with the space station complex, supported two space walks to facilitate the first use of the Leonardo Multi-Purpose Logistics Module and installed a station robot arm anchor point. They also witnessed the first station crew changeout, unloaded 5 tons of equipment and experiments, and packed up a ton of unneeded station equipment and trash for return to Earth on Discovery.

March 20, 2001 - All of Discovery's systems are checked out for landing, with Commander Jim Wetherbee and his team ready to escort home the first International Space Station expedition crew late Tuesday. Wetherbee and the shuttle crew - Pilot Jim Kelly and Mission Specialists Andy Thomas and Paul Richards - spent the day packing for the trip home and completing checks of the steering jets and flight controls the shuttle will use. They also fired Discovery's orbital maneuvering system engines to adjust the shuttle's orbit and optimize landing opportunities, testing the braking rockets they use to begin re-entering the Earth's atmosphere.

The crew aboard Discovery began its sleep shift at 8:42 a.m. EST and woke up to begin final landing preparations at 4:42 p.m. The returning Expedition One crew members set up the reclining seats to help ease the stress of landing on their bodies, which have not experienced gravity for four and a half months.

March 19, 2001 - After the undocking -- which occurred as the two vehicles flew over Guyana, South America, and its capital of Georgetown -- Pilot Jim Kelly flew Discovery one-and-a-quarter turns around the space station before initiating a final steering jet separation burn at 12:48 a.m. EST. During the flyaround at a distance of 450 feet the crew recorded television and still images of the station's exterior.

Discovery's crew spent the rest of the day exercising, talking with their families and enjoying some scheduled off-duty time. The shuttle crew went to sleep at 9:12 a.m. and was awaken at 5:12 p.m. to the song "Just What I Needed," performed by The Cars and played for returning International Space Station Commander Bill Shepherd, who, along with crew mates Yuri Gidzenko and Sergei Krikalev, is riding home aboard Discovery after four and a half months in orbit.

March 18, 2001 - Carrying nearly one ton of trash and excess equipment, along with personal items belonging to the returning Expedition One crew, the Leonardo cargo carrier was detached from its port on the International Space Station early this morning and gently placed back in Discovery's payload bay by Mission Specialist Andy Thomas.

After crewmate Paul Richards released the 16 bolts and associated latches holding the Multi-Purpose Logistics Module to its Common Berthing Mechanism port, Thomas received a "go" to begin moving the module with the shuttle's 50-foot-long robotic arm about 5:40 a.m. EST. About 90 minutes later, at 7:08 a.m., the Italian-built module was securely latched back in its its cargo bay cradle, ready for return to Earth. Discovery's crew began its eight-hour sleep period at 9:42 a.m., awaking at 5:42 p.m.

The hatches between the shuttle and station were closed for a final time at 8:32 EST, leaving Expedition Two Commander Yury Usachev and his Flight Engineers, astronauts Jim Voss and Susan Helms, aboard the complex. The second crew is beginning a four-month stay aboard the station that will see the complex continue to grow in research capability and self-sufficiency as a robotic arm, more experiments and a new airlock are attached on future missions.

During the almost nine days Discovery has been docked at the station, the crews unloaded almost five tons of experiments and equipment and repacked almost a ton of returning items. Discovery's mission also has set the stage for the continued expansion of the station when a Canadian robotic arm is launched aboard the shuttle Endeavour next month. Pilot Jim Kelly was at the shuttle's helm as Discovery undocked from the station at 11:32 p.m.

March 17, 2001 - The crews of Discovery and the International Space Station spent their day carefully packing the Leonardo cargo transfer module and reboosting the station's orbit. Commander Jim Wetherbee set in motion the third and final reboost of the station's altitude by executing a programmed series of gentle steering jet firings. The third reboost raised the shuttle altitude two statute miles, making the total reboost imparted during the STS-102 mission a little more than seven statute miles.

With their time together drawing to a close, the crews of Discovery and the International Space Station today plan to detach the Leonardo cargo module from the station and latch it back aboard the shuttle for return to Earth.

Almost five tons of equipment and experiments were unloaded from Leonardo during the six days it was attached to the station, and almost a ton of trash, unneeded equipment and items that accompany the returning station crew was loaded aboard.

Flight controllers cleared about three hours of time for Commander Jim Wetherbee and Pilot Jim Kelly aboard Discovery this evening in the event some troubleshooting steps were required with the onboard shuttle flight control computers. Two of the four primary computers were turned on quickly yesterday at the request of Mission Control as part of a general power up to increase the heat being generated by shuttle electronics. The shuttle's cooling system had gotten too cold, causing ice to form in a water line, and controllers needed several more electronics powered on to warm up the cooling system.

However, while the crew slept Saturday, flight controllers spent the day evaluating whether the quick power up could cause a software glitch onboard. At no time, however, did the onboard computers experience a problem. Still, an extensive analysis was conducted to double-check the system and a decision was made to transition the software loads within the flight computers as a confidence test to ensure they are fully operational.

March 16, 2001 - The crews of Discovery and the International Space Station welcomed the addition of another day orbiting the Earth in tandem as they continued to pack for the trip home. Discovery's return will mark the homecoming of the first resident space station crew.

Lead Flight Director John Shannon said shuttle and station managers decided to extend the mission to allow ground controllers more time to analyze the placement and weight distribution of items the crew is sending home aboard the Leonardo Module. He said the decision also reflects added flexibility in station-era timelines, and the availability of sufficient stores of fuel and life-supporting consumables on board.

Commander Jim Wetherbee joined the rest of his Discovery crew, the returning Expedition One crew and the Expedition Two crew in the station's Destiny Module as they answered questions from reporters during the traditional in-flight news conference. The briefing included queries from reporters in Texas, Florida, Alabama and Moscow and covered subjects ranging from whether the Expedition One crew is looking forward to its return to Earth to whether its astronauts and cosmonauts would relish another long-duration stay at the outpost.

"We basically put the space station in commission," said Bill Shepherd, who moved to the Discovery crew Wednesday. "We have taken something that was an uninhabited outpost, and we now have a fully functional station where the next crew can do research. I think that's the substance of our mission." Although Shepherd said he would be happy to return home to his family, he wasn't as sure about returning to Earth gravity. "To be honest," he said, "I'm not that anxious to see what it's going to be like."

The crew was awakened this afternoon to the Irish song "The Rising of the Moon" performed by The Clancy Brothers with Tommy Makem, selected for Discovery's Pilot Jim Kelly by his family in honor of St. Patrick's Day tomorrow. Two more full days of joint work remain before Discovery is scheduled to undock from the complex Sunday night. Tonight, in addition to packing work, Commander Jim Wetherbee will perform a third and final reboost of the station's altitude, gently firing the shuttle's small steering jets to raise the spacecraft by a little over two statute miles. Altogether, Discovery will leave the station a little more than seven miles higher than when it arrived.

Following a second hour-long reboost of the station, the complex is now orbiting at an altitude of about 237 statute miles.

March 15, 2001 - Aboard the International Space Station today, astronauts and cosmonauts assembled and partially activated a key piece of construction equipment - the control station for a 58-foot-long robot arm that will be delivered to the station next month.

Expedition Two Flight Engineers Jim Voss and Susan Helms spent most of their workday installing the Space Station Remote Manipulator System workstation inside the Destiny Laboratory. They activated a portion of the system that will be used to route television pictures from docked space shuttles to the control station for use by arm operators. The astronauts and cosmonauts also took some time off to rest after a busy week and to continue handing over duties aboard the scientific outpost.

The crew was awakened this afternoon to the song "She Blinded Me With Science" performed by Thomas Dolby and played in recognition of the laboratory outfitting and initial station scientific work enabled by Discovery's flight. As the crew awoke, Mission Control informed Commander Jim Wetherbee of the mission's extension.

Discovery will now spend almost nine days docked to the station, allowing ground controllers and the crew more time to ensure all necessary items are stowed away correctly aboard the Leonardo cargo module. Leonardo, filled with equipment to return to Earth, now will be detached from the station and latched back in Discovery's payload bay early Sunday morning, a day later than originally planned.

March 14, 2001 - The first crew exchange aboard the International Space Station is complete now that Susan Helms has moved her custom-fitted Soyuz seat liner into the Russian return vehicle about 1:00 a.m. EST today. Though the crew transfer is complete, the official end of the Expedition One increment will occur Saturday when Discovery undocks at 10:54 p.m. EST.

The hatches between Discovery and the station remain open and cargo transfer activities continue ahead of schedule. More than 70 percent of the equipment and supplies already has been moved from the Italian-built Leonardo Multi-Purpose Logistics Module into the station. All seven systems racks - equipment that includes electronics, communications gear, experiments and medical facilities - already are in the Destiny laboratory. Included among those racks is the first major piece of station science equipment, called the Human Research Facility, which will study the effects of weightlessness on the human body.

Both crews begin their sleep periods at 10:42 a.m. today. They were awakened at 4:42 p.m. with the song "Should I Stay, or Should I Go?" performed by The Clash, played for returning International Space Station Expedition One Commander Bill Shepherd from his wife, Beth.

March 13, 2001 - Astronauts Paul Richards and Andy Thomas spent six and a half hours outside the International Space Station this morning, continuing work to outfit the station and prepare for delivery of its own robotic arm next month. The second and final planned space walk of the mission began at 12:23 p.m. EST, and concluded at 6:44 a.m. The 6-hour, 21-minute space walk brings the total exterior construction time on the station to 124 hours over the course of 18 space walks, and the total EVA time in shuttle program history to 392 hours, 36 minutes over 62 separate space walks.

Richards and Thomas installed a stowage platform for spare station parts and attached a spare ammonia coolant pump to the platform. They also finished connecting several cables put in place by Astronauts Jim Voss and Susan Helms during their nearly nine-hour-long space walk Sunday. The cables, on the exterior of the Destiny laboratory module, will provide power and control of the station's Canadian-built robotic arm. Known as the Space Station Remote Manipulator System, the arm will be delivered and installed by the STS-100 crew in April. Richards and Thomas also scaled the station to the top of its 240-foot-wide solar arrays and were successful in engaging a fourth latch for the port-side array's structural brace.

Discovery's crew went to bed at 10:42 a.m. EST, and got an extra half-hour of sleep before being awakened at 7:12 p.m. Discovery's crew was awakened this evening for the seventh day of the mission with the song "Free Fallin" by Tom Petty, a favorite of astronaut Susan Helms who today will take up official residence on the station as a member of the outpost's second crew.

March 12, 2001 - Leonardo, the first of three logistics modules developed and built by the Italian Space Agency, was affixed to a berthing port on Unity overnight as mission specialist Andy Thomas carefully maneuvered it into place at 1:02 EST a.m. today. Operating Discovery's robotic arm, Thomas grappled the "crate" full of equipment racks and supplies at 10:37 p.m. Sunday, lifting it out of the shuttle's cargo bay at 11:10 p.m. Over the course of the next two hours, he slowly and deliberately moved the 11-ton module into place.

The shuttle and station crews rejoined each other at 10:15 p.m. Sunday when the hatches separating them during the previous day's record-setting 8-hour, 56-minute space walk were reopened. With the hatches open, Jim Voss - the station's newest resident after a 11:45 p.m. swap-out with Sergei Krikalev - joined Expedition One Commander Bill Shepherd and Expedition Two Commander Yury Usachev on board the station. Only one more crew swap remains to complete the station's change of watch. Expedition One Commander Bill Shepherd will trade places with Expedition Two Flight Engineer Susan Helms on Tuesday. The hatches were closed once again at 6:39 a.m. today after 8 hours, 24 minutes. So far, the hatches between the shuttle and station have been open for a total of 10 hours, 27 minutes.

The song "From a Distance" performed by Nanci Griffith awakened Discovery's crew, and astronauts Paul Richards and Andy Thomas quickly began preparing for a planned six and a half hour space walk.

March 11, 2001 - STS-102 Mission Specialists Susan Helms and Jim Voss donned space suits and began the 17th station assembly space walk at 12:12 a.m. EST. Inside Discovery, Paul Richards choreographed their activities and served as liaison with Mission Control.

Helms and Voss successfully prepared Pressurized Mating Adapter-3 for repositioning from Unity's Earth-facing berth to its port-side berth to make room for Leonardo, the Italian Space Agency-built Multipurpose Logistics Module. They disconnected eight cables and removed an Early Communications System antenna from the left-side Common Berthing Mechanism so that shuttle robotic arm operator Andy Thomas could put the mating adapter in its place, freeing up the Earth-facing berthing port for Leonardo. The space walkers also removed a Lab Cradle Assembly from the cargo bay and installed it on the side of the Destiny laboratory module, where it will form the base for station robotic arm to be launched on STS-100 in mid-April.

After the pair reentered Discovery's airlock they waited for Thomas to maneuver the docking port to its new location, but remained at the ready to assist if needed. After Commander Jim Wetherbee drove the Common Berthing Mechanism latches home and secured the docking port at 8:43 a.m., the airlock was repressurized, ending the space walk at 9:08 a.m. after 8 hours 56 minutes, making it the longest space walk in Shuttle history. The space walk brings the total exterior construction time on the station to 117 hours 39 minutes over the course of 17 space walks, and the total EVA time in Shuttle program history to 386 hours, 15 minutes over 61 separate space walks.

Both crews began an eight-hour sleep period at 10:42 a.m. EST. Discovery's crew was awakened at 6:42 p.m by the song "Blast Off" from the animated feature Scooby Doo and the Alien Invaders, played for astronaut Paul Richards as a selection from his children. The shuttle and station crews reopened the hatches between the two spacecraft at about 9:12 p.m. They will remain open for about eight hours before they again must be closed in preparation for a second space walk Monday night. Discovery and the station are in excellent condition in an orbit of about 235 statute miles.

March 10, 2001 - Commander Jim Wetherbee waited patiently as International Space Station controllers locked solar arrays in place before he steered the Space Shuttle Discovery to a 1:38 a.m. EST docking. The linkup, which occurred as the two spacecraft were flying above the southern Pacific Ocean, just east of New Zealand, was delayed by about an hour when one of the station's P-6 solar arrays failed to register as being properly feathered to avoid damage from the shuttle steering jet plumes. Wetherbee hovered 400 feet away from the Pressurized Mating Adapter-2 port as he awaited the array latch verification and proper lighting conditions for his final approach.

After hooks and latches created a secure bond, the hatches between the two spacecraft were opened at 3:51 a.m. EST, beginning eight days of docked operations. The eighth shuttle mission to the station will feature the first crew exchange aboard the multinational orbiting outpost and the delivery of the first research experiment package for the Destiny laboratory module.

Expedition Two Commander Yury Usachev was the first to join Expedition One Commander Bill Shepherd, Pilot Yuri Gidzenko and Flight Engineer Sergei Krikalev aboard the station. He was followed closely by Wetherbee, Expedition Two Flight Engineers Jim Voss and Susan Helms, and visiting shuttle astronauts Jim Kelly, Andy Thomas and Paul Richards. All 10 crew members spent several minutes greeting each other in the spacious Destiny module.

The hatches between the two spacecraft were closed temporarily at about 6:45 a.m. EST Saturday so that preparations for STS-102's first space walk by Helms and Voss can begin on time at 11:47 p.m. EST. That space walk will involve preparations for berthing of the Leonardo "moving van," or Multipurpose Logisitics Module to the Destiny module.

March 9, 2001 - Overnight, the STS-102 astronauts Jim Wetherbee, Jim Kelly, Paul Richards and Andy Thomas, and Expedition 2 crew members Yury Usachev, Jim Voss and Susan Helms installed and checked out a targeting camera, extended the orbiter docking system's spring-loaded docking ring and unpacked rendezvous tools such as laptop computers and hand-held range-finders.

They began an abbreviated seven-hour sleep period at 10:42 a.m. today and were awakened with the Russian song "Vashe Blagorodiye," a song from a movie entitled "White Sun of the Desert" that is traditionally watched by cosmonauts the night before a launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The song was played for Expedition Two Commander Yury Usachev, who is spending his last day aboard Discovery before beginning a handover of station command with Expedition One crewmember Yuri Gidzenko. All activities are on track for a docking of Discovery to the station at 12:34 a.m. tomorrow morning.

March 8, 2001 - Shuttle Discovery blasted off from the Kennedy Space Center at sunrise this morning to deliver a new resident crew to the International Space Station (ISS) as the third shuttle mission in less than four months began in flawless fashion.

Commander Jim Wetherbee, Pilot Jim Kelly and Mission Specialists Andy Thomas, Paul Richards, Yury Usachev, Jim Voss and Susan Helms rocketed away from Launch Pad 39-B at 6:42 a.m. Eastern time, lighting up the crystal clear central Florida skies as they began their pursuit of the international complex. Usachev, Voss and Helms, who make up the second Expeditionary crew to the ISS, will replace Expedition One Commander Bill Shepherd, Pilot Yuri Gidzenko and Flight Engineer Sergei Krikalev, who were in their 128th day in space and their 126th day aboard the Station as Discovery began its pursuit.

The astronauts set up computers and flight deck gear before beginning an eight-hour sleep period at 11:42 a.m. EST. Discovery's crew was awakened at 7:42 p.m. to begin its first full day on orbit. The wakeup song from Mission Control was "Living The Life" by the Rockit Scientists, a group of training division instructors with whom shuttle Commander Jim Wetherbee plays drums from time to time.

After wakeup, the crew of four shuttle and three station expedition crewmembers got busy checking out systems and equipment to assist with mission objectives, including the robotic arm, the two spacesuits that will be worn for the first Extravehicular Activity (EVA), and the rendezvous tools to assist with the final hours of Discovery's approach and docking to the station.

Overview - STS-102 will be the eighth shuttle mission to visit the International Space Station and will serve as a crew rotation flight. Space Shuttle Discovery will:

1. Deliver the second resident crew, Expedition Two, to the station: Yury Usachev, James Voss and Susan Helms and return the Expedition One crew to Earth: Bill Shepherd, Sergei Krikalev and Yuri Gidzenko.

2. Carry equipment, including six racks in the 4.5-ton Italian-built Leonardo Multi-Purpose Logistics Module (MPLM), to assist in outfitting of the U.S. Destiny Laboratory Module. The STS-102 crew will install Leonardo onto the International Space Station in order to unload its contents and then return it to Earth.

3. Provide logistics and resupply.

4. Perform two space walks to complete assembly operations.

The Leonardo Multipurpose Logistics Module, which was built by the Italian Space Agency (ASI), is the first of three such pressurized modules that will serve as the International Space Station's "moving vans," carrying laboratory racks filled with equipment, experiments and supplies to and from the station aboard the space shuttle. The unpiloted, reusable logistics modules function as both a cargo carrier and a space station module when they are flown. Mounted in the space shuttle's cargo bay for launch and landing, they are berthed to the station using the shuttle's robotic arm after the shuttle has docked. While berthed to the station, racks of equipment are unloaded from the module and then old racks and equipment may be reloaded to be taken back to Earth. The logistics module is then detached from the station and positioned back into the shuttle's cargo bay for the trip home. When in the cargo bay, the cargo module is independent of the shuttle cabin, and there is no passageway for shuttle crewmembers to travel from the shuttle cabin to the module. In order to function as an attached station module as well as a cargo transport, the logistics modules also include components that provide some life support, fire detection and suppression, electrical distribution and computer functions. Eventually, the modules also will carry refrigerator freezers for transporting experiment samples and food to and from the station. Although built in Italy, the logistics modules, technically known as Multipurpose Logistics Modules or MPLMs, are owned by the U.S. and provided in exchange for Italian access to US research time on the station.

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