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Next on the NASA Space Shuttle Status Report:
NASA stacked, wrapped and gapped hardware this week for all three space shuttles!
You are about to see what's happening in space shuttle processing at Kennedy Space Center in Florida!
The NASA Space Shuttle Status Report starts right now.
Music.
I'm Bob Holl, NASA test director, and this is the NASA Space Shuttle Status Report.
First up in this week's shuttle news:
Orbiter Discovery, its solid rocket boosters and its engines prepare for mission STS-121 to the International Space Station.
It's all happening right now at Kennedy Space Center.
Inside the Vehicle Assembly Building, solid rocket booster stacking continues.
The right forward center portion of the stack is now in place.
The twin white solid rocket boosters are filled with propellant and provide the thrust Discovery needs to soar into space.
In other Discovery news, an Oxygen Generating System was delivered to KSC from Marshall Space Flight Center for mission STS-121.
The system will produce breathing air for the space station crew.
And inside the Space Station Processing Facility, also at Kennedy:
Discovery's payload, named Leonardo, is now equipped with the necessary racks to hold the food,
clothing and spare parts that Discovery will carry into space.
Back inside the Orbiter Processing Facility, work is nearing completion on the gap fillers in the "priority one" area on Discovery's underside.
When this is complete, the gap filler team will move to bay one to work on orbiter Atlantis.
Speaking of Atlantis, more than 400 gap fillers are now replaced beneath the orbiter in Orbiter Processing Facility bay one.
New gap filler application techniques were developed to ensure that they stay in place during the orbiter's re-entry into Earth's atmosphere.
Thermal protection system blanket installation in the nose cap is under way on orbiter Endeavour in Orbiter Processing Facility bay 2.
The blankets are made of layered pure silica and are hand sewn with silica thread.
These blankets protect the orbiter against temperatures up to about two-thousand degrees.
That's all the time we have for this week's Space Shuttle Status Report --
your inside look at NASA's three space shuttles as they prepare for flight!
Until our next report, stay with NASA TV and nasa.gov for the latest in mission news.
For the NASA Space Shuttle Status Report, I'm Bob Holl.