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ArchivesText SizeSTS-95 Mission: John Glenn's Flight; SPACEHAB
Space Shuttle: Discovery
Launch Pad: 39B 
Launched: October 29, 1998, 2:19:34 p.m. EST
Landing Site: Kennedy Space Center, Florida
Landing: November 7, 1998, 12:04:00 p.m. EST
Runway: 33
Rollout Distance: 9,508 feet
Rollout Time: 59 seconds
Revolution: 134
Mission Duration: 9 days, 19 hours, 54 minutes, 2 seconds
Orbit Altitude: 310 nautical miles
Orbit Inclination: 28.45 degrees
Miles Traveled: 3.6 million 

Crew Members

                    

Image above: STS-95 Crew photo with Commander Curtis L. Brown, Pilot Steven W. 
Lindsey, Mission Specialists Scott E. Parazynski, Stephen K. Robinson, Pedro 
Duque, Payload Specialists Chiaki Mukai and John H. Glenn. Image Credit: NASA 

Launch Highlights

 At 12:30 p.m., the hatch was closed with crew inside the space shuttle 
Discovery, just as President Bill Clinton's Air Force One plane touched down at 
the Cape Canaveral Air Station skid strip. The countdown proceeded to T-9 
minutes, but was held an additional 8.5 minutes while the launch team discussed 
the status of a master alarm heard during cabin leak checks after hatch closure. 
Once the count picked up and the Orbiter Access Arm was retracted, the Range 
Safety Officer (RSO) requested a hold at T-5 minutes due to aircraft in the 
restricted air space around KSC. Once the aircraft cleared the area, the RSO 
gave the all clear signal and the countdown proceeded. Following main engine 
start, but prior to booster ignition, the drag chute compartment door fell off, 
but posed no problem for the mission. Managers decided not to deploy the chute 
upon landing.

Mission Highlights

The primary objectives of STS-95 included conducting a variety of science 
experiments in the pressurized SPACEHAB module, the deployment and retrieval of 
the Spartan free-flyer payload, and operations with the Hubble Space Telescope 
Orbiting Systems Test (HOST) and the International Extreme Ultraviolet 
Hitchhiker payloads being carried in the payload bay. The scientific research 
mission also returned space pioneer John Glenn to orbit - 36 years, eight months 
and nine days after he became the first American to orbit the Earth.

A slate of more than 80 experiments filled the nearly nine days in space. In 
addition to a variety of medical and material research, the crew released the 
Petite Amateur Naval Satellite, or PANSAT, to test innovative technologies to 
capture and transmit radio signals that normally would be lost because the 
original signals were too weak or contained too much interference. The crew also 
released the Spartan free-flying satellite to study the sun and the solar wind 
in a research effort to help scientists better understand a phenomenon that 
sometimes can cause widespread disruptions of communications and power supplies 
on Earth.

Medical research during the mission included a battery of tests on Payload 
Specialist Glenn and Mission Specialist Pedro Duque to further research how the 
absence of gravity affects balance and perception, immune system response, bone 
and muscle density, metabolism and blood flow, and sleep.

The Hubble Space Telescope Orbital Systems Test provided an on-orbit test bed 
for hardware that will be used during the third Hubble servicing mission. 

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