SUBMITTED BY ARTHUR N1ORC - AMSAT A/C 31468

*Shuttle Payload Bay Doors Close for Landing*

Image above: The Aurora Borealis, also known as "northern lights", is featured in this photograph taken by a STS-116 crew member onboard Discovery during flight day 11 activities. Image Credit: NASA TO SEE PICTURE GO TO:

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/main/index.html

The STS-116 crew closed Space Shuttle Discovery’s payload bay doors about 12:13 p.m. EST in preparation for a 3:56 p.m. landing at Kennedy Space Center, Fla.

If flight controllers elect to take this landing opportunity, Commander Mark Polansky will fire Discovery's jets to begin the descent to Kennedy at 2:49 p.m.

All three landing sites have been activated today due to forecasts of questionable weather at Kennedy and Edwards Air Force Base in California. The forecast for the White Sands Space Harbor in New Mexico is favorable.

Six more opportunities are available today if flight controllers pass on the first. The last opportunity at Kennedy is at 5:32 p.m. Three exist at Edwards – 5:27 p.m., 7 p.m. and 8:36 p.m. Two are available at White Sands – 5:27 p.m. and 7:02 p.m.

The STS-116 crew is returning home after a successful mission to the International Space Station. While at the station, the crew continued the construction of the outpost with the addition of the P5 spacer truss segment during the first of four spacewalks. The next two spacewalks rewired the station’s power system, leaving it in a permanent setup. A fourth spacewalk was added to allow the crew to retract solar arrays that had folded improperly.

Discovery also delivered a new crew member and more than two tons of equipment and supplies to the station, most of which were located in the SPACEHAB cargo module. Almost two tons of items no longer needed on the station are returning to Earth with STS-116.