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Astronauts deploy first of two solar wings BY WILLIAM HARWOOD STORY WRITTEN FOR CBS NEWS "SPACE PLACE" & USED WITH PERMISSION Posted: September 14, 2006 With the international space station in free drift, the Atlantis astronauts unfurled the first of two new solar array wings today, beaming back spectacular video showing the gold-colored blankets extending like venetian blinds against the black backdrop of space.
The folded solar cell blankets unfurled smoothly as a self-assembling mast extended on computer command, pulling the array blankets from their storage boxes. As expected, numerous slats in the two blankets making up wing 4A stuck together because of a phenomenon known as 'stiction." To deal with that, the array was first extended to 49 percent and then halted to let the panels warm up in the sun. That strategy worked, prompting astronaut Pam Melroy in mission control to tell the astronauts: "Just for your information, we are starting to see some of the panels release." When deployment resumed a half hour later, the remaining stuck-together slats pulled apart with no problems, causing the blankets to ripple slightly as they released. But engineers had planned for that, deploying in a so-called high-tension mode that prevented excess movement. "Solar array full deploy," commander Brent Jett radioed a few minutes past 7 a.m. "Several releases, where the springs went taut to release the panels. However, we didn't see any tension mechanism movement, the tension bar came up at the end. So high-tension mode did its job and released the panels successfully." "That's great news, Brent, and we can confirm that on telemetry," Melroy replied. With wing 4A fully extended to a length of about 115 feet, the astronauts turned their attention to the second panel, 2A, waiting for good lighting to carry out the same two-step deployment procedure. Once fully extended, the two arrays will stretch more than 240 feet from tip to tip. See our earlier story for more background details on the arrays.
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VIDEO:
PORT 3/PORT 4 TRUSS KEEL PIN REMOVED AND STOWED 