Show Astronauts successfully stitch up space station panels Rui Jia-Rui Chong Los Angeles Times Astronauts successfully stitched together tears in a sheet of solar panels on the International Space Station early Saturday morning in a seven-hour seven operation that was one of the most difficult ever attempted in space Scott E. E snipped a guide wire that had snagged on the long wing-like wing solar array and another wire that had gotten tangled in the damaged area He also laced five makeshift braces made of aluminum wire and dubbed insulating tape cuff links by the crew into the panels to stabilize them The style Frankenstein-style stitching kept the solar panels together as flight controllers at Johnson Space Center in Houston slowly unfurled the array to its full length a Astronaut Doug Wheelock lo k floated about 90 feet away from at at t the the base of the solar array and monitored the operations There were concerns that could have been electrocuted as he worked on the solar panels which continued to operate during the repairs Hl M fi r r rg But one of the commented that there was nothing more problematic during t the e repair than some smudges on his glove A later inspection inside the station turned up a small tear on one of the gloves And Anda a pair of nose needle-nose pliers was Jost lost in space Mission controllers are tracking the pliers and s said id they dont don't believe the tool poses any collision risk forthe for forthe forthe the station Overall mission managers were pleased with how smoothly the operation went Im happy to report the crew performed flawlessly today said lead officer Dina Con Contella tell a during a news conference at mission control in Houston and Wheelock who arrived at atthe atthe atthe the space station Oct 25 on the shuttle Discovery began their at am a.m. EDT j t suspended by his feet fuet it- it over the solar array at the end of two robotic arms arms anns controlled by astronauts in the space station As he approached the solar array which is more than J 00 feet from the space station described the snarl of wires around the panels as a hairball i 1 about 2 spent 2 1 hours repairing the solar panels He and Wheelock returned to the space station J at I 22 pm p.m. Mission managers are still trying to figure out how the solar sheet tore in two places but they believe a guide wire snagged on the sheet at it unfolded on Tuesday The station had enough power from its other solar arrays to keep its crew and the Discovery astronauts comfortable But NASA needed to get all an the power-generating power systems working to accommodate t new Japanese and European laboratories scheduled to tobe tobe be delivered over the next few months By Sunday afternoon the array was providing amps of electricity which was 3 amps less than what they would normally get from an array said Mike NASA's space station manager Mission managers still have to decide what to dot do- I. I about a malfunctioning rotating joint that allows ji the starboard solar array to track the sun 1 There may not be enough J time for another repair 1 during this mission The shuttle is scheduled to return to Earth on Wednesday 1 J hr I |