KSC-00pp1453

A worker (left) in the Space Station Processing Facility explains use of the equipment in the foreground to STS-100 Mission Specialist Umberto Guidoni (center) and Commander Kent Rominger (right). Guidoni is with the European Space Agency. Mission STS-100, scheduled to launch April 19, 2001, will include the Multi-Purpose Logistics Module (MPLM) Raffaello and the Space Station Remote Manipulator System (SSRMS) as its payload. MPLMs are pressurized modules that will serve as the International Space Station's “moving vans,” carrying laboratory racks filled with equipment, experiments and supplies to and from the station aboard the Space Shuttle. The SSRMS is the primary means of transferring payloads between the orbiter payload bay and the International Space Station for assembly