Europe's Columbus laboratory le...(ence payloads this will be a great day f...),Health

Date:2/7/2008

ence payloads, this will be a great day for Europe, and I see this day coming very soon now said the ESA Director General, Jean-Jacques Dordain. Its been a long road since the early days of our Spacelab laboratory onboard the Space Shuttle. With Columbus and the upcoming ATVs, weve grown from the status of passenger to that of fully-fledged partner. For the first time, a European-manned facility will be permanently operated in orbit, under the control of a European centre. The know-how we acquired to reach this point will be of tremendous importance in preparing for the future of human space flight, in Earth orbit and beyond, with our international partners. I wish to pay tribute to all the teams at ESA and the industrial contractors in Europe for this success as well as to ESAs Member States, which, in spite of all the changes in the configuration of the ISS throughout the years, have lent their support to allow ESA to become a highly trustworthy partner in this endeavour. I take the opportunity also to acknowledge NASA, its Administrator and all his teams involved in this extraordinary achievement, for their dedication in maintaining a robust schedule in their difficult task of assembling the International Space Station.

Space Shuttle Atlantis is due to undock from the ISS on 16 February and to land back in Florida two days later.

Unlike the other crew-members of the STS-122 missions, Lopold Eyharts is due to remain onboard the station, trading places with NASA astronaut Dan Tani as a member of the 16th permanent crew of the ISS. While on the station, Lopold Eyharts will proceed with the commissioning of Columbus and the first experiments onboard. He will return to Earth in about two months with the next shuttle flight, STS-123, currently scheduled for launch on 11 March for a 16 day mission.

Depending on traffic planning at the ISS, Lopold Eyharts could still be onboard the ISS when the 'Jules Verne' ATV arrives, with its first load
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Contact: media.relations@esa.int 33-153-697-299 European Space Agency Source:Eurekalert

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