UPDATE – Congratulations to Schlegel. He sucessfully completed his spacewalk yesterday. “I’m holding on to Columbus. It’s a good feeling,” he said (Florida Today). Watch the Reuters video on YouTube.

Another delay hit the installation of Europe’s Columbus space laboratory last week. Astronaut Hans Schlegel fell ill shortly after last week’s shuttle launch, meaning the start of the module’s installation has been set back by a day.

The European Space Agency says his condition is “not life- or mission-threatening in any way, but that could affect his efficiency during a spacewalk”. So another astronaut will take Schlegel’s place on a space walk to install the module on the International Space Station.

Installation of Columbus will now begin today. Rex Walheim and Stanley Love will install the impressively named ‘Power Data Grapple Fixture’ on the lab which will later allow the robot arm on the ISS to grab Columbus and move it into position (NASA press release).

A number of news sources say Schlegel should get a spacewalk on Wednesday and doctors are confident he’ll be up to the task then.

The nature of Schlegel’s illness has not been disclosed but it has been stated that the rest of the crew are not at risk of contracting it. Florida Today speculates that he has space adaptation sickness.

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Previous Great Beyond posts on Columbus:

– Shuttle launches, press rejoices, February 08, 2008

– Shuttle and Euro lab grounded, December 10, 2007

Nature News on Columbus

BBC News video ‘inside Europe’s science laboratory’

Image: Columbus / ESA – D. Ducros