STS-49 MCC Status Report #8

                      MISSION CONTROL CENTER
                      STS-49 Status Report #8


Sunday, May 10, 1992, 8 a.m.

Planning shift flight controllers spent a quiet night reviewing
plans for today's rendezvous, capture, repair and reboost of the
Intelsat IV satellite.

With virtually no problems on board the space shuttle fleet's
newest orbiter attention focused on Intelsat and its position near
the center of the control box, or target area.  The second
spindown maneuver of the spacecraft was successfully performed at
7:53 p.m. CDT Saturday, reducing Intelsat's spin from 5 to 2.33
revolutions per minute.  A trim maneuver was performed about 1:45
a.m. Sunday to put the spacecraft in the capture attitude.
The third spindown maneuver at 8:21 a.m. will decrease the spin to
0.65 rpm.

Endeavour, now in a 191 by 188 nm orbit, will maneuver at 10:43
a.m. to decrease the distance between the two spacecraft.  Then,
at 11:29 a.m., Endeavour will begin a phase adjustment maneuver to
refine the distance between the two spacecraft at the start of the
capture phase.  The final rendezvous phase will begin at 2:33 p.m.
with the terminal phase initiation burn.

The earlier maneuvers are designed to assure that the terminal
phase maneuver will occur at orbital apogee and coincide with
orbital noon.  This will be critical in providing Commander Dan
Brandenstein with the lighting he needs to be able to see Intelsat
as he manually flies his ship into position below the satellite.

Flight controllers in Houston continue to refine their
calculations for the remaining burns, and the start of final
rendezvous phase may change slightly based on those refinements.

Spacewalkers Pierre Thuot and Rick Hieb will emerge from
Endeavour's airlock about 3:33 p.m. and, if all goes well,
Intelsat should be in the grasp of the robot arm by 5 p.m.