STS-107 MCC Status Report #02<br />Thursday, Jan. 16, 2003 - 4:30 p.m. CST<br />Mission Control Center, Houston, Texas<br /><br />Columbia's crewmembers unstowed equipment and began activation of the<br />Spacehab Research Double Module in the shuttle's cargo bay, setting the<br />stage for 24-hour-a-day science during the shuttle's 16-day research<br />mission.<br /><br />Columbia lifted off at 9:39 a.m. CST from the Kennedy Space Center in<br />near-perfect weather after a flawless countdown. The crew opened the<br />spacecraft's payload bay doors about 11:35 a.m. and then were given the<br />go-ahead for on-orbit operations.<br /><br />The seven-member crew is divided into two teams, each working 12 hours per<br />day during most of the flight. Members of the blue team, Pilot Willie McCool<br />and Mission Specialists Dave Brown and Mike Anderson, began a six-hour sleep<br />period at 2:47 p.m. CST and will be awakened at 8:49 p.m. Red team members,<br />Commander Rick Husband, Mission Specialists Kalpana Chawla and Laurel Clark,<br />and Israeli Payload Specialist Ilan Ramon, begin a 7-hour sleep period at<br />9:39 p.m.<br /><br />Spacehab is a pressurized research module 20 feet long, 14 feet wide and 11<br />feet high. It houses equipment for 59 experiments, three of them mounted on<br />its roof. Its activation marks the beginning of the major science activities<br />of Columbia's mission.<br /><br />All systems aboard Columbia continue to function flawlessly.<br /><br />The shuttle is at an altitude of about 178 statute miles, in an orbit<br />inclined 39 degrees to the equator. Aboard the International Space Station,<br />Expedition 6 crewmembers, Commander Ken Bowersox, Flight Engineer Nikolai<br />Budarin and NASA ISS Science Officer Don Pettit, received a live video<br />uplink of the launch through the ISS Flight Control Room in the Mission<br />Control Center at Johnson Space Center in Houston.<br /><br />The next STS-107 mission status report will be issued Friday afternoon, or<br />earlier if events warrant.