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STS-77 Space Shuttle Status Report
May 18, 1996     Updated 2 p.m. EDT

George H. Diller
Kennedy Space Center

	The countdown for the launch of Space Shuttle Endeavour on
STS-77 continues on schedule this afternoon.  Activities to stow the
time-critical experiment samples into the Spacehab module went well
overnight and work to stow the mid-deck experiments was finished late
this morning.  Activation of the orbiter’s communications systems is
now complete.  The retraction of the gantry-like rotating service
structure which provides the Space Shuttle’s primary access and
weather protection began at 11:48 a.m. and was fully retracted at
12:20 p.m.

        Other activities scheduled for today include filling the
pad’s sound suppression system water tank, activation and calibration
of the orbiter’s inertial measurement units on the flight deck, 
setting the switches in the cockpit for launch, activating the
orbiter’s fuel cells and stowing the astronaut’s personal effects
onboard.

	Fueling of the Space Shuttle’s external tank with liquid
hydrogen and liquid oxygen is scheduled to begin at 9:40 p.m.  The
fueling activities take about three hours to complete.

	The astronauts toured the launch pad this morning and the
commander and pilot flew the Shuttle Training Aircraft.  They will go
to bed in the crew quarters at 4:30 p.m. and be awakened at 1:30 a.m.
Breakfast is scheduled at 2 a.m. and after a weather briefing and
donning of their launch and entry suits they will depart for Pad 39-B
at 3:10 a.m.  They will begin boarding Endeavour at 3:40 a.m. and the
crew hatch will be closed and sealed at 5 a.m.

	There remains only a 10 percent chance of not meeting the
launch weather criteria due to the slight chance of some isolated
morning showers over the Atlantic Ocean moving onshore.