The launch of Space Shuttle Discovery Flight STS-116 scheduled for the night of 7-8 December will bring Swedish ESA astronaut Christer Fuglesang to the ISS. This is possibly the most difficult flight among complex missions to complete the ISS in orbit.
With the arrival of STS-116, German ESA astronaut and ISS resident crew member Thomas Reiter will be replaced by Sunita Williams from NASA. Reiter will be returning back to Earth on the Shuttle together with Christer Fuglesang, after nearly six months in space.
The main objective of Flight STS-116 is to put into service two huge electricity-generating solar array panels, already onboard the station since September 2006. Switching this new electrical system on is a very difficult and complex task which requries Fuglesang and his NASA counterpart Robert Curbeamto perform two ""spacewalks"" to rewire one half of the station each.
Today's Video News Release provides all the background footage - including English soundbites by Fuglesang - to cover the story.
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10:00:35 (Animation the ISS GVs Christer Fuglesang trains for Celsius mission, GVs press conference) , A European Space Agency astronaut is about to make history by rewiring the International Space Station. Christer Fuglesang, a forty-nine year old particle physicist from Sweden, will fly to the station this December as part of a seven-strong space shuttle crew.
10:00:52 Soundbite Christer Fuglesang, ESA astronaut: ëYesterday when we drove out here for the first time, and you saw the vehicles standing in the distance, you got a very special feeling - you realised that youíre actually there, that you are going in a couple of weeks, and sometimes got this extra excitement. Thatís very nice.í
10:01:11 (GVs the ISS in orbit) Named the Celsius mission, after the eighteenth century astronomer who invented the thermometer, Fuglesangís flight will mark the beginning of the final construction stage of the space station.
10:01:27 (GVs Christer Fuglesang tra