Space History for March 8

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883
Died, Albumasar [Ahmad Aboe M Gafar al-Balkhi], Arabic astronomer

1618
Johannes Kepler discovered the third law of planetary motion (he soon rejected the idea after some initial calculations were made, but later, on May 15, confirmed the discovery).

1861
E W Tempel discovered asteroid #65 Cybele.

1888
J Palisa discovered asteroid #273 Atropos.

1893
A Charlois discovered asteroid #358 Apollonia.

1894
A Charlois discovered asteroid #389 Industria.

1905
M Wolf discovered asteroid #559 Nanon.

1910
Baroness Raymonde de Laroche of Paris became the first licensed female pilot.

1910
In Britain, John Theodore Cuthbert Moore-Brabazon became the first man to receive a pilot's certificate.

1917
Died, Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin, first large-scale builder of the rigid dirigibles which eventually became synonymous with his name
http://www.firstworldwar.com/bio/zeppelin.htm

1927
Pan American Airlines was incorporated.

1934
A photograph taken by Edwin Hubble shows as many galaxies as the Milky Way has stars.

1938
Y Vaisala discovered asteroid #1453 Fennia.

1939
Born, George William Reed, astronomy writer, cartoonist (Dark Sky Legacy)

1946
The first helicopter was licensed for commercial use in New York City.

1951
M Itzigsohn discovered asteroid #1596 Itzigsohn.

1952
Born, Aleksandr Aleksandrovich Volkov, cosmonaut (Soyuz TM-8, T-14, TM-7)

1952
Born, Vladimir Vladimirovich Vasyutin, at Kharkov Ukraine, cosmonaut (Salyut 7 EO-4-2, Flight Up/Back: Soyuz T-14)

1964
F Borngen discovered asteroid #3181 Ahnert.

1976
A 1,774 kg stony meteorite, the largest one observed, fell in Jilin, China.

1979
A volcanic plume on Jupiter's moon Io was discovered in Voyager 1 images by Linda Morabito, the first known extraterrestrial volcano.

1979
NASA's shuttle Columbia (OV-102) was transported 38 miles overland from Palmdale.

1986
The Japanese probe Suisei flew within 109,800 km of Comet Halley.

2001 05:42:00 CST (GMT -6:00:00)
NASA launched STS 102 (Discovery) for International Space Station Flight 5A.1.
NASA launched Discovery as STS 102 on 8 March 2001 for the International Space Station Flight 5A.1 mission. Its primary objectives were to deliver the Expedition Two crew and the Leonardo Multi-Purpose Logistics Module to the station.

Discovery spent almost 13 days in orbit, with nearly nine of those days docked to the International Space Station. In addition to the crew transfer and attaching the Leonardo Multi-Purpose Logistics Module, the shuttle crew transferred supplies and equipment to the station, and completed two space walks.

Space walkers spent a total of 15 hours and 26 minutes during two STS-102 excursions outside the docked complex. The first space walk was the longest in space shuttle history.

Mission Specialists Susan Helms and James Voss - who later became Expedition Two crewmembers - prepared the Pressurized Mating Adapter 3 for repositioning from the Unity Module’s Earth-facing berth to its port-side berth to make room for the Leonardo Multi-Purpose Logistics Module supplied by the Italian Space Agency.

Two days later, Mission Specialists Paul Richards and Andy Thomas spent 6.5 hours outside the International Space Station, continuing work to outfit the station and prepare for delivery of its robotic arm.

The Expedition One/Two crew transfer was a carefully choreographed process carried out one replacement at a time to ensure the three current members of the station crew would be able to return home, at any time during the switch, aboard the Soyuz spacecraft attached to the station. As a member of the Expedition Two crew formally transferred from the space shuttle to the station, that crew member's custom-designed seat liner, called an Individual Equipment Liner Kit, was installed in the Soyuz spacecraft docked to the station: Crew members officially join the station when they install their seat liners in the Soyuz. The seat liner of the replaced crew member was removed from the Soyuz, and he then became a member of the shuttle crew.

STS 102 ended 12 days, 19 hours, 49 minutes after launch, on 21 March 2001, when Discovery landed on Runway 15 at the Kennedy Space Center following a surprising turnaround in the Florida weather: Entry Flight Director Wayne Hale made the decision to land at Kennedy just before midnight after cloudy skies and gusty winds due to a low pressure system that raced through the Shuttle Landing Facility area faster than expected the previous night had cleared. The shuttle had traveled a total of 5,357,762 statute miles during its flight.

The flight crew for STS 102 was: James D. Wetherbee, Commander; James M. Kelly, Pilot; Andrew S.W. Thomas, Mission Specialist 1; Paul W. Richards, Mission Specialist 2; Yury V. Usachev, Expedition 2 Commander (remained at ISS); James S. Voss, Expedition 2 Flight Engineer (remained at ISS); Susan J. Helms, Expedition 2 Flight Engineer (remained at ISS); William M. Shepherd, Expedition 1 Commander (returned from ISS); Sergei Krikalev, Expedition 1 Flight Engineer (returned from ISS); Yuri P. Gidzenko, Expedition 1 Soyuz Commander (returned from ISS).

http://www.spaceflight.nasa.gov/shuttle/archives/sts-102/index.html

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