Atlantis shuttle astronauts welcomed on space station

THE crew of the international space station welcomed Atlantis’ six astronauts on board yesterday after the space shuttle arrived carrying the first new addition for the orbiting laboratory in more than three years.

The hatch between two orbiting spacecraft was opened more than one hour after Atlantis commander Brent Jett eased the space shuttle into the station’s docking port at 11.48am Irish time.

The shuttle’s near two-day trip from Earth ended as the two vehicles were passing about 350 kilometres above the south-eastern part of the Pacific Ocean.

Atlantis pilot Chris Ferguson, on his first trip to space, had a wide grin on his face as he was given a tour of the space station by its crew.

A short time later, the space shuttle’s robotic arm was used to grasp the 17-tonne addition in Atlantis’ cargo bay and then to hand it over to the space station’s own robotic arm.

The addition is a 13.7-metre structure with folded solar wings inside. The crew was on schedule with all the tasks on their to-do list and were not experiencing any problems, said lead flight director Paul Dye.