SPACE CENTER, Houston -- Astronauts completed flight control checks aboard space shuttle Discovery and practiced landing on a computer simulator as they made final preparations to return to Earth.
As the crew prepared for the return trip and arrival back on Earth tomorrow, the seven astronauts got good news from Mission Control: for the first time in three years, all four gyroscopes that control the orientation of the international space station were working.
Discovery's astronauts spent nine days of their 13-day mission resupplying the orbiting lab and two spacewalking astronauts replaced a gyroscope, which stopped working in 2002. They also restored power to another gyroscope, which stopped spinning in March.
The station's crew waited until Discovery undocked to rev up all four gyroscopes at once.
