STS-94
Mission Control Center
Status Report # 02
Wednesday, July 2, 1997 - 6:30 a.m. CDT

  The red team of STS-94, Commander Jim Halsell and Pilot Susan Still
along with Mission Specialist Don Thomas and Payload Specialist Greg
Linteris have been busy continuing the payload activation process
begun by their blue team counterparts as the research efforts of the
Microgravity Science Laboratory (MSL-1) mission get into full swing.

  The STS-94 crew will spend more than two weeks studying the
properties of combustion and the behavior of metals, materials and
fluids in the absence of gravity.  The astronauts are split into two
teams working 12-hour shifts to provide around-the-clock operations in
the pressurized Spacelab science module.

  Shortly after waking up just before midnight, Halsell and Still set up the bicycle ergometer 
in the Shuttles middeck area.  Each of the STS-94 crewmembers will use the bicycle for 
exercise during the flight.  Thomas activated the Large Isothermal Furnace (LIF) experiment 
and the Expedite the Processing of Experiments to the International Space Station (EXPRESS) 
rack while Linteris continued the activation of Protein Crystal Growth experiments.

  Remaining activities in the red teams day will include the setup and
checkout of the Wireless Data Acquisition System (WDAS) experiment.
This is a proof of concept payload that uses wireless RF signals to
relay data from temperature sensors in the payload bay and Spacelab
module.  Analysis of future Space Station operation requirements
indicate that there may be a need for real time monitoring of
temperature readings in various parts of the station and a system such
as the WDAS could meet that need.

  Columbias blue team of astronauts, Janice Voss the payload
commander, Mission Specialist Mike Gernhardt and Payload Specialist
Roger Crouch will wake up shortly after 9 this morning to begin its
second day of work in space.

  The blue team will conduct an interview beginning at 5:17 this
afternoon with the Fox News Channel to discuss the reflight of
Columbia and a second chance at accomplishing the MSL science goals.

The next STS-94 status report will be issued later today.

###

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