Article from Ottawa Sun
Tue, August 14, 2007
HOUSTON — As he soared high above the Pacific Ocean, Canadian astronaut Dave Williams took a moment to marvel at the view while on a spacewalk to replace a broken part on the International Space Station.
"This is the most amazing ride I've ever had," Williams said yesterday.
Williams, along with American astronaut Rick Mastracchio, successfully replaced a broken gyroscope on the space station.
It was Williams' second spacewalk, and he's expected to do a third on Friday.
The record-breaking third spacewalk would make the Saskatoon-born and Montreal-raised astronaut the Canadian with the most time spent floating freely in space.
And Williams' name has been mentioned if NASA decides there is a need to repair a gouge on the shuttle Endeavour. NASA was working feverishly to decide whether the crew would need to repair the gouge on the craft's underside later this week.
A chunk of insulating foam smacked the shuttle during liftoff last week, causing the damage.
American teacher-turned-astronaut Barbara Morgan and other crew members used a laser boom attached to the shuttle's Canadarm to create 3-D images of the gash and a few other damaged areas that NASA officials say pose no threat.
Depending on the extent of the damage, astronauts can apply protective paint, screw on a shielding panel, or squirt in filler goo.
During its liftoff from Florida last week, a chunk of insulating foam fell off and hit the shuttle, carving out the 7.6-cm-long gouge that penetrates all the way through the thermal shielding.
A Canadian-made 3-D scanning system is inspecting the damage.
The Laser Camera System, designed by Neptec, an Ottawa-based firm, is one of three cameras attached to a Canadian-made inspection boom.
Following a review into the Columbia shuttle explosion in 2003, NASA made it mandatory to have a way of imaging the entire thermal protection system, including making accurate 3-D models of any damage.
While it is referred to as a camera, the tool provides a real measurement of the damage and the surrounding tiles to an accuracy of less than a millimetre and not simply an image that is interpreted on Earth.
"It basically makes a map of whatever it sees," Neptec president Iain Christie said.