SCIENCE:
The 30,800 pound, $183 million segment is the product
of Boeing's Huntington Beach plant.
By GARY ROBBINS
The Orange County
Register
HUNTINGTON BEACH -
Orange County's greatest contribution to the International
Space Station, the orbiting outpost's 30,800-pound "heart" has been
completed and will be flown to Florida's Kennedy Space Center on
Thursday for final tests. The mechanical heart is the 44 foot centerpiece
of the 356-foot aluminum frame that will link the station's living
quarters, laboratories and solar arrays. The $183 million segment
will be trucked from the Boeing Co.'s Huntington' Beach plant to
Los Alamitos Army Airfield on Thursday morning and transported east
aboard an oversized cargo plane called Super Guppy. "We call S-0
the heart because most of the station's power, |
data and life-support cables flow through it," said
Keith Takahashi, a Boeing spokesman. About eight miles of electrical
wire will course through the station's aluminum backbone, collecting
and distributing energy from eight solar panels. Boeing constructed
three sections of the spine in Huntington Beach, including S-0,
which includes two of the gyroscopes that will keep the station
in proper orbit. Local workers also built the passageway between
Zarya and Unity, the two station pieces now in orbit, and Unity's
shuttle docking bay. S-0 is scheduled to be sent into orbit in 2001,
along with a Canadian-made robotic arm that will slide along the
spine like a railroad car, transporting pieces and equipment. But
the National Aeronautics and Space Administration says the launch
could be delayed because Russian engineers have been slow in completing
other key sections that need to go up first.
Register science
writer Gary Robbins can be reached at (714) 796-7970. E-mail: grobbins@link.freedom.com.
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