Penultimate Space Shuttle Crew Discusses Recent Mission
WASHINGTON -- The last crew to fly aboard space shuttle Endeavour will
discuss its mission to the International Space Station -- the
penultimate flight of the shuttle program. The astronauts of the
STS-134 flight and three members of the station's Expedition 26 crew
will be in the Washington area on Thursday, Aug. 4.
Mark Kelly commanded the STS-134 mission and was joined by Pilot Greg
H. Johnson and Mission Specialists Mike Fincke, Drew Feustel, Greg
Chamitoff and European Space Agency astronaut Roberto Vittori. The
astronauts completed a 16-day mission to the station in June.
The shuttle crew members will give a presentation to NASA employees
about their 16-day mission at 10 a.m. EDT at NASA Headquarters' James
E. Webb Auditorium, located at 300 E St. SW in Washington. The
presentation will air live on NASA Television and the agency's
website. Both crews will be available for media interviews from 1 to
2 p.m. Journalists must call 202-358-1100 to attend the presentation
or to schedule an interview.
Expedition 26 Commander Scott Kelly and Flight Engineers Cady Coleman
and European Space Agency astronaut Paolo Nespoli also will be
available to news media representatives.
Later that day, NASA and the Maryland Space Grant Consortium invite
the public to a discussion with Mark Kelly, Johnson, Finke and
Vittori at 6:30 p.m. at The Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.
The astronauts will share their video presentation and answer
questions from the audience at the Bloomberg Center for Physics and
Astronomy's Schafler Auditorium. Free parking is available in the
Muller parking deck on San Martin Drive, adjacent to Bloomberg.
Reporters interested in covering the event should contact Lisa De
Nike at 443-287-9960 or Lde@jhu.edu.
The STS-134 crew delivered the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer-2 (AMS) to
the space station. AMS, a particle physics detector, searches for
various types of unusual matter by measuring cosmic rays. Its
experiments are helping researchers study the formation of the
universe and search for evidence of dark matter, strange matter and
antimatter. The mission also flew the Expedite the Processing of
Experiment to Space Station (Express) Logistics Carrier 3 (ELC-3), a
platform that carries spare parts that will sustain space station
operations now that the shuttles have been retired from service.
During the mission's four spacewalks, astronauts conducted maintenance
work and installed new station components. They were the last
spacewalks by shuttle crew members. For more information about the
STS-134 crew members and their mission, visit:
http://go.nasa.gov/sts-134
For a map of the Johns Hopkins campus (the Bloomberg Center is
building #56 and the Muller parking deck is #58), visit:
http://bit.ly/nHVn0h
For more information about the space station, visit:
http://www.nasa.gov/station
For NASA TV schedule information and links to streaming video, visit:
http://www.nasa.gov/ntv
Source: