Shuttle Crew Chases, Retrieves Out-Of-Control Spartan Satellite

Endeavour’s astronauts chased and recovered a solar-science satellite Sunday that was spinning and facing the wrong way because of an apparent power problem.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration will not know whether the telescopes on the Spartan satellite collected any data until Endeavour returns to Earth next week and is unloaded.

Shuttle commander David Walker and his crew discovered that the satellite had shut down automatically when they pulled up to retrieve it two days after having released it.

Walker was forced to steer Endeavour around the satellite. As the two craft zoomed around Earth at 5 miles per second, he painstakingly lined up Endeavour’s crane with the grapple pin on Spartan.

More than a half-hour later than planned, astronaut Michael Gernhardt reached out with the crane and grabbed the satellite. He hauled the 2,800-pound boxy craft into the cargo bay, where it will remain for the rest of the 11-day mission, due to end next Monday.

The 230-mile-high rendezvous was one of the shuttle mission’s major objectives.