STS-49 Mission Control Status 2

                    MISSION CONTROL CENTER
                       STATUS REPORT #2

8 a.m. CDT Friday May 8, 1992

Endeavour and the Intelsat-VI communications satellite are
set to continue their orbital rendezvous dance later this
morning when Intelsat flight controllers perform the second
of three planned burns to lower the satellite's orbit to an
altitude that the shuttle can reach.

The first maneuver took place at 10:44 p.m. CDT Thursday and
successfully lowered the low point of the 300 nautical mile
orbit to 191 nautical miles.  The second burn will lower the
high point of the orbit to 223 nautical miles about 8:56 a.m.
CDT.

Endeavour fired its orbital maneuvering system engines
briefly at 11:52 p.m. Thursday to begin its preparations for
an encounter with Intelsat. That burn raised Endeavour's
orbit to 182 by 145 nautical miles.

Endeavour's next burn is scheduled for 3:45 p.m. CDT today,
and is intended to raise its apogee or highest point to 189
nautical miles.

Meanwhile, flight controllers on the ground continued their
overnight planning. Endeavour's crew is scheduled to
depressurize the cabin to 10.2 psi and check out the
space suits in anticipation of the flight day 4 space walk to
grapple Intelsat. The crew also is scheduled to power up the
remote manipulator system robot arm and perform a survey of
the payload bay with the arm's cameras.

All systems aboard the new orbiter are working well, with the
exception of a few minor anomalies.  Controllers are checking
the status of one of the avionics bay fans because of a
pressure change reading that is slightly high.  The crew
already has performed one in-flight maintenance activity to
check filters, but found no lint that might be clogging the
avionics bay's airways.

The crew was unable to activate one of its onboard personal
computers before going to sleep, but flight controllers have
been working to solve the malfunction and will suggest a
possible solution when the crew awakens.

Endeavour is currently in a 183 by 147 nautical mile orbit,
and Intelsat is in a 304 by 189 nautical mile orbit.