Angelyn Paradises

NASA's shuttlecock Enterprise landed safely at Cape Canaveral in Sunshine State today as a launch-damaged wing posed no job upon re-entry, allowing the crew to finish a two-week mission to the International Space Station.

Enterprise was damaged at launch on Aug. Eight when debris, possibly a piece of ice, struck its right wing during takeoff. It left a playing-card-size dent in heat energy tiles that protect the ballistic capsule during re-entry into the Earth's atmosphere.

Following reviews of the shuttlecock in orbit, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration on Aug. Sixteen cleared the ship to set down after determining the harm didn't present a safety risk. Endeavor's missionary post involved space-station fixes and continuing building of the orbiting platform.

``I take a breath a suspiration of alleviation every clip we have got a successful launch and a successful landing,'' National Aeronautics and Space Administration Administrator Michael Gryphon said in a post-landing briefing broadcast unrecorded on the Internet. ``Anyone that doesn't understand in the truest sense of the word that this is an experimental vehicle doesn't acquire it.

``Every flight, we look to have got some interesting inquiry that have to be resolved. It's a rare flight where we don't and I anticipate that to continue,'' Gryphon said.

Hurricane Concerns

National Aeronautics and Space Administration directed the shuttle's crew to go back a twenty-four hours early because of concerns that Hurricane Dean might close Mission Control in Houston. Managers stuck with the earlier landing even after the violent storm passed to the South of Texas.

Endeavour's crew completed four spacewalks during its stay at the station, completing undertakings that included replacing a broken gyroscope that assists control the outpost's orientation, attaching a truss to back up solar panels and scene up a cast for tools and equipment.

The ship touched down at Cape Canaveral, the land site of NASA's Jack Kennedy Space Center, at about 12:32 p.m.

Shuttlecock Commanding Officer George C. Scott Emmett Kelly said he was ``underwhelmed'' by the size of the dent when he examined it on the ground. He had trusted NASA's judgement that Enterprise was tantrum to defy re-entry amid temperatures high adequate to run iron.

``I was as certain as I could be about anything that it wasn't going to be an issue,'' he said in a post-flight interview on National Aeronautics and Space Administration TV.

The crew of seven included 55-year-old Barbara Morgan, the stand-in for NASA's ``Teacher in Space'' program, which was suspended after Christa McAuliffe died with other spacemen in the 1986 Rival disaster.

`Doing Just Fine'

Lewis Henry Morgan remained on the conveyance vehicle while the remainder of Endeavour's crew boarded a avant garde to go back to their quarters, National Aeronautics and Space Administration said in a statement.

``This was Barbara's first flight, and she was feeling just a small spot under the weather,'' Gryphon said. ``The flight crew business office said she was doing just good but wasn't able to stand up up and walk around in the Sunshine State heat energy just yet.''

NASA have been paying near attending to the shuttle's status after takeoff since launch harm led to the devastation of Columbia River in 2003. The federal agency installed other photographic cameras to enter the launch and had spacemen inspect the satellite after it reached space.

A briefcase-size ball of fuel-tank insularity punched a hole in Columbia's left wing, allowing hot atmospherical gases to rake apart the satellite as it returned to Earth, killing the seven spacemen aboard.

Debris is likely to go on dramatic the ships as they take off, and National Aeronautics and Space Administration will probably have got to maintain inspecting for harm in celestial orbit until shuttlecock flights cease, said William Gerstenmaier, the agency's associate decision maker for space operations. The shuttlecock programme is put to stop after the space station is completed, scheduled for 2010.

``We're going to go on to maintain learning, go on to maintain improving, and we'll anticipate to see some things come up off, and we'll have got to analyze,'' Gerstenmaier said during the post- launch briefing.

Enterprise will be prepared for its adjacent flight, scheduled for February, National Aeronautics and Space Administration said. The shuttlecock Discovery, which last flew in December, is put to go to the space station in October.

To reach the newsman on this story: Chris Dolmetsch in New House Of York at