KSC-98pc1294

STS-95 Payload Specialist Chiaki Mukai (M.D., Ph.D.), representing the National Space Development Agency of Japan (NASDA), gives a two-thumbs up salute while suiting up in the Operations and Checkout Building prior to her trip to Launch Pad 39-B. Mukai and the rest of the STS-95 crew are at KSC to participate in the Terminal Countdown Demonstration Test (TCDT) which includes mission familiarization activities, emergency egress training, and a simulated main engine cutoff. The other crew members are Pilot Steven W. Lindsey, Mission Specialist Scott E. Parazynski, Mission Specialist Stephen K. Robinson, Mission Specialist Pedro Duque of Spain, representing the European Space Agency (ESA), Payload Specialist John H. Glenn Jr., senator from Ohio, and Mission Commander Curtis L. Brown. The STS-95 mission, targeted for liftoff on Oct. 29, includes research payloads such as the Spartan solar-observing deployable spacecraft, the Hubble Space Telescope Orbital Systems Test Platform, the International Extreme Ultraviolet Hitchhiker, as well as the SPACEHAB single module with experiments on space flight and the aging process. Following the TCDT, the crew will be returning to Houston for final flight preparations