BRUCE BUCKINGHAM: This is Shuttle Launch Control at T-3 hours and holding, and we do see our astronauts as
they are seated for their, what we traditionally call a breakfast.
However, it is more of a lunch for them since they've been awake since about 10:45 today.
And, of course, they are making their second attempt to launch aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery.
The astronauts, of course, are Nicholas Patrick, mission specialist, as well as our pilot, William Oefelein,
and KSC's own Joan Higginbotham, mission specialist number four, commanded by Mark Polansky,
making his second trip into space, and Suni Williams, who's going to be making
her first trip into space and staying a whole lot longer than the rest of these folks are.
Rounding out the crew, Bob Curbeam and, of course, our astronaut representing the European Space Agency,
Christer Fuglesang, mission specialist number three. And those two gentlemen on
the end will be taking the lion's share of the spacewalks on this mission today.
And we see at the table the STS-116 patch, which depicts the shuttle rising above the Earth, and,
and the space station, and shows the U.S. and Swedish flags as it trailing,
trails the shuttle, depicting the international composition of this particular crew.