Around the Nation

Astronauts Wrap Up Spacewalk for Repairs

CAPE CANAVERAL -- Spacewalking astronauts completed almost all of the greasy repairs on a gummed-up joint at the international space station Saturday, leaving a few chores for another day.

As spacewalk No. 3 was getting underway, a new recycling system for converting urine into drinking water broke down again.

It was the third day in a row that the urine processor shut down. The problem appeared to be related to how a centrifuge is mounted in the contraption. The centrifuge is on mounts meant to minimize vibrations. As a solution, flight controllers asked station commander Michael Fincke to remove the isolation mounts. The problem could limit the amount of recycled water that is brought back to Earth for testing aboard space shuttle Endeavour next weekend.

The $154 million water recycling system, delivered a week ago by the space shuttle, is essential for allowing more astronauts to live on the space station next year.

Saturday's spacewalk by Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper and Stephen Bowen was considered the most grueling of the mission and focused entirely on the clogged solar wing-rotating joint. The joint stopped working properly more than a year ago and cannot keep the solar wings on the right side of the space station pointed toward the sun.

Mission Control wanted to keep the spacewalk close to the seven-hour mark and, six hours in, told the astronauts to wrap up and start heading back in. The remaining chores will be squeezed into the fourth and final spacewalk of the mission Monday.

The spacewalk lasted three minutes shy of seven hours, making it the longest of the mission.

Teen Abandoned in Nebraska

KIMBALL, Neb. -- Nebraska officials say a 14-year-old California boy is the last child reported abandoned under the state's safe-haven law before it was changed to limit such drop-offs to infants no more than 30 days old. The change took effect Saturday. State officials say the boy was driven to Kimball County Hospital on Friday by his mother, then was placed in a foster home. That brings to 36 the number of children left at Nebraska hospitals since the law went on the books in July.

1 Dead in Shooting at Busy Mall

TUKWILA, Wash. -- Shots erupted in a packed Seattle area shopping mall Saturday after an apparent argument between a gunman and two other young men, killing one of the men, creating panic among shoppers and sending police on a store-to-store search for the shooter, authorities said. The mall was locked down during the search. A police spokesman said "thousands" of shoppers were at the mall when the shooting took place just before 3:45 p.m. At least two people were detained for questioning, the spokesman said.

-- From News Services