Daily News Monday, August 3, 1992 24-hour audio service at 202/755-1788 % Eureca deployed by Atlantis crew yesterday, ESA still `fixing it'; % STS-46 crew now focused on Tethered Satellite deploy preparations; % Atlantis and flight crew performing perfectly, consumables in good shape; % Goddard controllers working to return Hubble to nominal orbital operations; % Oshkosh Air Fair underway, 50-foot student-built NASP model featured; % First-ever Space Station Users Conference gets underway at Marshall Center. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * The Atlantis crew finally was able to deploy the European Retrievable Carrier, Eureca, at 3:07 am EDT yesterday following troubleshooting efforts to resolve what appeared to be a Eureca data problem. The crew of Atlantis had spent Friday, following their perfect launch, setting up the Eureca for deployment later that evening. European Space Agency flight controllers, operating the Eureca remotely from the European Space Operations Center in Darmstadt, Germany, noticed serious data dropouts in the communications stream coming from Eureca. Orbiter flight controllers at Johnson Space Center and their European counterparts in Darmstadt worked through Saturday to resolve the problem. Early in this process, it was believed the shuttle's payload data interrogator, an intermediate black box between the Eureca data systems and the shuttle data systems, was the cause of the problem. Direct communications with the Eureca through ESA ground stations at Kourou and elsewhere confirmed the problem was onboard the Eureca. The ESA team then reconfigured the internal data path of Eureca and, at first, satisfied themselves that the problem was under control. Later Saturday afternoon this was determined not to be the case as communications dropouts from Eureca continued to plague the ESA Darmstadt team. Notwithstanding these problems, the ESA controllers decided to allow the Eureca deployment early yesterday and immediately began using Eureca's onboard thrusters to move away from Atlantis. The thrusters were to have raised the orbit of Eureca. A data problem interrupted the process and Eureca is presently in a lower-than-nominal orbit while Darmstadt continues to troubleshoot the Eureca data problem. Following the deployment, the Atlantis crew turned their attention to the Tethered Satellite System experiments, which had been delayed 24 hours for the Eureca problem. The shuttle maneuvered to the lower orbit required for TSS deploy this morning. The crew also has activated several of the TSS onboard experiments and will spend the remainder of today activating the rest of the TSS systems and performing functional checks on the satellite. The STS-46 flight crew will begin unreeling the tether and deploying the satellite at 2:19 pm EDT tomorrow. The satellite will be deployed to a distance of 12-1/2 miles from the orbiter. The system contains a number of electrical sensors that will measure the voltage and current developed between the shuttle and the TSS as the pair fly through the Earth's magnetic field lines. The expected maximum voltage is 5,000 volts. Atlantis systems and the STS-46 flight crew are reported by Johnson Space Center controllers to be performing exceptionally well. Flight controllers are considering a one-day mission extension, though that decision will not be made until after the Tethered Satellite System experiments have been concluded. JSC mission management this morning said Atlantis' consumable usage will support the full TSS experiment set as well as a one-day extension. Pending any change in the mission timeline, landing is set for Friday, August 7, at 8:09 am EDT at the Kennedy Space Center's Shuttle Landing Facility. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Flight controllers at the Goddard Space Flight Center are analyzing Hubble Space Telescope onboard computer data to help them recover the spacecraft from its entry into two successive `safe' modes this past week. On Wednesday, July 29, the HST spacecraft entered an inertial hold mode as a result of bad data contained in an updated ephemeris being loaded into the onboard guidance and navigation system. While the spacecraft's onboard systems were executing the safing commands, the spacecraft entered a deeper safety condition. This second safe mode was entered because of an error that was contained in software loaded onboard back in May. Goddard controllers expect routine operations to be resumed within the next few days. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * The Experimental Aircraft Association Fly-In opened in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, last week, and will stay open through this Friday, August 7. The NASA pavilion features a 50- foot-long mock-up of the National AeroSpace Plane which was designed and built by students at Mississippi State University. The NASA exhibit also focuses on the Agency's work in the area of high-speed civil transport. The two-trailer Space Station Freedom habitation and laboratory module exhibit is also on display, outside the NASA pavilion. The space station display allows visitors to walk through high-fidelity mockups of the U.S. habitation and laboratory modules. Following the Oshkosh Air Show, the Freedom display will be transported to Chicago, where it will be open to the public near the Adler Planetarium from August 8 through 22. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * NASA is holding the first Space Station Freedom Utilization Conference at the Marshall Space flight Center this week. The purpose of the conference, which continues through Thursday, August 3 through 6, is to inform potential researchers about Freedom capabilities, plans and opportunities for research and to provide an open forum for exchange of information and ideas between space station managers and potential space station investigators. As part of the forum, experienced researchers who have flown equipment aboard Spacelab will describe their experiences and learned lessons Here's the broadcast schedule for Public Affairs events on NASA Select TV. Note that all events and times may change without notice, and that all times listed are Eastern. Live indicates a program is transmitted live. Monday, August 3, 1992 Live 2:51 pm Tethered Satellite System science operations, from Atlantis. Live 3:30 pm Mission status briefing from JSC. Live 4:16 pm Tethered Satellite System science operations, from Atlantis. 11:30 pm Replay of Flight Day 4 activities. Tuesday, August 4, 1992 Live 11:41 am Pre-deploy operations for Tethered Satellite System, from Atlantis. Live 12:50 pm Tethered Satellite System boom extension, from Atlantis. Live 2:29 pm Tethered Satellite System deploy and flyaway, from Atlantis. Live 10:00 pm Mission status briefing from JSC. 11:30 pm Replay of Flight Day 5 activities. Wednesday, August 5, 1992 Live 6:19 am Tethered Satellite System retrieval, from Atlantis. Live 1:00 pm Mission status briefing from JSC. Live 7:52 pm Tethered Satellite System docking, from Atlantis. Live 8:43 pm Securing Tethered Satellite System back to its deploy mechanism, from Atlantis. Live 10:00 pm Mission status briefing, from JSC. 11:00 pm Replay of Flight Day 6 activities. Thursday, August 6, 1992 Live 8:56 am Middeck views of secondary payload experiments, from Atlantis. Live 1:00 pm Mission status briefing, from JSC. 10:30 pm Replay of Flight Day 7 activities. Friday, August 7, 1992 7:56 am De-orbit maneuver by Atlantis (not televised). Live 8:09 am Landing of Atlantis at Kennedy Space Center Shuttle Landing Facility. TBD Landing video playback. TBD Post-landing press conference, from KSC. TBD Astronaut departure from KSC for JSC. This report is filed daily at noon, Monday through Friday. It is a service of NASA's Office of Public Affairs. The editor is Charles Redmond, 202/453-8425 or CREDMOND on NASAmail. NASA Select TV is carried on GE Satcom F2R, transponder 13, C-Band, 72 degrees West Longitude, transponder frequency is 3960 MegaHertz, audio subcarrier is 6.8 MHz, polarization is vertical.