Oct. 24, 2006

Katherine Trinidad
Headquarters, Washington 
202-358-3749

James Hartsfield
Johnson Space Center, Houston
281-483-5111 

MEDIA ADVISORY: M06-168

NASA ROBOTICS OPERATOR DISCUSSES ROLE ON NEXT SHUTTLE FLIGHT

NASA astronaut Nick Patrick, who will operate the space shuttle's 
robotic arm during a mission targeted to launch in December, will be 
available for interviews by satellite from 7 to 8:45 a.m. EDT Friday, 
Oct. 27. 

To participate, media should contact NASA's Johnson Space Center 
newsroom in Houston at 281-483-5111 by 5 p.m. EDT Thursday, Oct. 26.

A citizen of both Britain and the United States, Patrick considers 
London and Rye, N.Y., his hometowns. He will be making his first 
spaceflight on Discovery during mission STS-116. The mission will 
deliver a small section of the station's girder-like truss and rewire 
the complex to bring electricity on line from solar arrays delivered 
in September.

Patrick has bachelor's and master's degrees from the University of 
Cambridge, England, and a master's and doctorate from the 
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Mass. 

Patrick was selected as an astronaut in 1998. Aboard Discovery, 
Patrick will use the shuttle's robotic arm to lift the new truss 
segment from the cargo bay for installation. Among other tasks, he 
will also use the arm to inspect the shuttle's heat shield.

He will be joined aboard Discovery by STS-116 Commander Mark Polansky, 
Pilot Bill Oefelein and mission specialists Joan Higginbotham, Suni 
Williams and Christer Fuglesang, a European Space Agency astronaut. 
Williams will remain aboard the station for six months. European 
Space Agency astronaut Thomas Reiter, currently aboard the station, 
will return to Earth on Discovery. 

For Patrick’s biographical information, visit: 

http://www.jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/htmlbios/patrick.html

Patrick’s interviews will be carried live on the NASA TV analog 
satellite AMC-6, at 72 degrees west longitude; transponder 5C, 3800 
MHz, vertical polarization, with audio at 6.8 MHz. B-roll video of 
his training for the mission will air at 6:30 a.m. EDT on Oct. 27. 
For NASA TV downlink, schedules and streaming video information, 
visit: 

http://www.nasa.gov/ntv

For more information about STS-116 and its crew, visit: 

http://www.nasa.gov/shuttle

	
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