After the successful launch, the astronauts onboard the space shuttle Discovery begin their first full day in space.

The crew will spend the workday inspecting the orbiter’s heat shield and preparing for their arrival at the International Space Station on Monday. In addition, the STS-124 astronauts are slated to check out spacesuits they will use during the mission’s three scheduled spacewalks.

Crew members will use the shuttle’s robotic arm to perform a limited inspection of Discovery and the leading edges of its wings. The purpose of this inspection is to ensure that, during the vehicle’s climb to orbit, no damage occurred to the tiles that protect Discovery from the heat of re-entry.

If required, the usual detailed inspection of the heat shield will be performed later in the mission after the Orbiter Boom Sensor System (OBSS) has been returned to Discovery. The OBSS is needed to perform a complete scan but was stowed on the station during STS-123 to make room for the Kibo laboratory’s Japanese Pressurized Module in Discovery’s payload bay.

The docking with the ISS is scheduled to occur on the flight day 3. Kelly will be at Discovery’s aft flight deck controls as the shuttle approaches the station for docking . Kelly will stop Discovery about 600 feet below the station. Once he determines there is proper lighting, he will maneuver Discovery through a nine‐minute back flip called theRendezvous Pitch Maneuver. That allows the station crew to take as many as 300 digital pictures of the shuttle’s heat shield.

Station crew members will use digital cameras with 400 mm and 800 mm lenses to photograph Discovery’s upper and bottom surfaces through windows of the Zvezda Service Module. The 400 mm lens provides up to 3‐inch resolution and the 800 mm lens up to 1-inch resolution. The photography is one of several techniques used to inspect the shuttle’s thermal protection system for possible damage. Areas of special interest include the thermal protection tiles, the reinforced carbon-carbon of the nose and leading edges of the wings, landing gear doors and the elevon cove. Systems engineers and mission managers will downlink the photos through the station’s Ku-band communications system for analysis.

When Discovery completes its back flip, it will be back where it started, with its payload bay facing the station. Kelly then will fly Discovery through a quarter circle to a position about 400 feet directly in front of the station. From that point, he will begin the final approach to docking to the Pressurized Mating Adapter 2 at the forward end of the Harmony node.

The first spacewalk is scheduled for the flight day 4, when Garan and Fossum will transfer the OBSS left after the previous shuttle mission from the station’s truss to space shuttle Discovery.