NASA officials announced that the space shuttle Discovery docked successfully with the International Space Station at 2:03 p.m. EDT.

About an hour before docking, STS-124 Commander Mark Kelly and Pilot Ken Ham guided the shuttle through a rendezvous, pitch maneuver giving the Expedition 17 crew the opportunity to take pictures of the orbiter’s protective heat-resistant tiles. These photos will be sent to engineers on Earth for analysis.

Following a standard safety briefing by station commander Volkov, the crews will get to work, activating the Station to Shuttle Power Transfer System (SSPTS) to provide additional electricity for the longer operation of shuttle systems, exchanging Chamitoff for Reisman as the new station crew member, and preparing for the next day’s spacewalk.

Fossum and Garan will review procedures for the first spacewalk before moving into the Quest airlock for the so‐called overnight campout.  Fossum, who conducted three spacewalks on STS-121, will be designated EV 1, or extravehicular crew member 1.  He will wear the suit bearing the red stripes for all three spacewalks, on flight days 4, 6, and 9.  Garan will be performing his first spacewalks as extravehicular crew member 2 and will wear the suit with no stripes.  Fossum and Garan will repeat the campout preparations the nights before the second and third spacewalks. Kelly will help suit up Fossum and Garan for the spacewalks, and Ham will serve as the spacewalk choreographer.

At 11:32 a.m. on Tuesday, Fossum and Garan will begin the first spacewalk by removing two Velcro straps used to restrain the elbow camera on the shuttles robotic arm.  The straps ensure the camera will not contact the Kibo module during the arm’s unberthing from Discovery’s payload bay.

At the same time, Hoshide and Chamitoff will operate the station’s robotic arm to grapple and remove the OBSS from its starboard truss stanchion and will hand it off to the shuttle’s arm, operated by Nyberg. Fossum and Garan will then prepare the Kibo module for unberthing, disconnecting an electrical umbilical, and removing insulation and a cover on the module’s common berthing mechanism.

Nyberg will move from Discovery’s aft flight deck to the station’s robotic workstation and join Hoshide for the unberthing and installation of Kibo to the left side of Harmony.  While Kibo is being installed, Fossum and Garan will work at the starboard Solar Alpha Rotary Joint (SARJ), which sustained unexplained damage to its outer race ring last year. Fossum and Garan will examine various areas of the joint, install a new Trundle Bearing Assembly to replace one that was removed during a station Expedition spacewalk last year, and test techniques for cleaning the damaged race ring.