BLOOMINGTON - Lincoln native Scott Altman will lead a space shuttle mission to repair the Hubble Space Telescope, NASA administrator Michael Griffin announced Tuesday.

"It really is a great day for space exploration. … It's a great day for NASA. It's a tremendous opportunity for science. It's a thrilling opportunity for me to be part of the team," said Altman, 47, during a news conference televised on NASA's Web site.

Altman, a graduate of Pekin Community High School and the University of Illinois, has been with NASA since 1995, five years after Hubble was launched. He has flown in space three times, including once to repair the space telescope in 2002. He also coordinated input from astronauts into the probe of the shuttle disaster in 2003, which canceled an earlier scheduled flight to make the Hubble repairs.

Altman, who retired from the U.S. Navy as a captain last year, lives in a Houston suburb with his wife. They have three sons, ages 26, 18 and 14.

The mission, the fifth shuttle flight to repair the heralded space telescope, is tentatively scheduled for May 2008. The work is expected to extend use of the telescope to 2013, five years beyond its current lifespan.

"That's certainly good news," Thomas Willmitch, planetarium director at Illinois State University, said of the mission. "The Hubble has been just incredibly productive over the years."

Among its discoveries, Hubble has explored the origin of the universe. Its instruments have viewed objects as they were 12 billion years ago and revealed new truths about our own solar system, he added.

"Hubble is well-designed to probe new discoveries as well as look at those things we new were there all along," Willmitch said. "It will be a long, long time before the Hubble explores everything out there."

Altman's parents, Fred and Sharon Altman, learned their son would return to space only when Griffin made the announcement on NASA television Tuesday morning.

"We are both delighted for him because it's something that he wants, but apprehensive because it's so dangerous," Fred Altman said.

Fred Altman recalled how he and his wife worried when their son led the last mission to repair Hubble. The crew installed a new power unit, a new camera and new solar arrays on that flight. The work took five space walks over five days.

The next mission also will involve five space walks to install several instruments, fix one that stopped working in 2004, replace its batteries and install a system for future space flights to dock with the Hubble to make repairs or to bring it back to earth. The mission will take 11 days.

Griffin said a staffed spaceflight was the only chance to extend Hubble's life. Scientists explored the potential of using robots to make the repairs after the shuttle disaster, but that idea was abandoned, he said.

Before announcing the mission, NASA officials had to find ways to assure the safety of the seven astronauts. A mission to Hubble is more dangerous than flights to the space station, which can be used as a safe haven in an emergency, he said. Among other hurdles, ways and tools had to be found for astronauts to inspect the shuttle's hull and make repairs in space before their return to earth. Griffin said a decision also was made to have second space shuttle ready to launch in the event a rescue mission is needed.

"It (the mission) can be flown safely. We are not going to risk a crew to make repairs," he said.

FYI

The Hubble Space Telescope was named after Edwin Hubble (1889-1953), who discovered the expansion of the universe and formulated what is now known as Hubble's Law.

- Hubble Space Telescope completes one orbit around the Earth every 97 minutes. Its speed is approximately five miles per second;

- Hubble is located about 375 miles above the surface of the Earth;

- The furthest objects Hubble has seen are galaxies well over 12 billion light years away;

- Hubble is 43.5 feet long and 14 feet around at its maximum. It is about the size of a large tractor-trailer truck. It operates on the equivalent of 20 car batteries;

- Cost at launch: $1.5 billion;

- Servicing missions were flown December 1993; February 1997; December 1999; and February 2002.

SOURCES: www.nasa.gov; www.hubblesite.org