Shuttle closing in on space station

HOUSTON, Dec 11 (Reuters) Space shuttle Discovery was closing in on the International Space Station TOday as astronauts prepared for a series of complicated jobs to rewire the outpost's electrical system.

The shuttle was on schedule to reach the station at 0336 IST.

The crew's first job is to transfer astronaut Sunita Williams to the station, where she will join NASA astronaut Michael Lopez-Alegria and Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Tyurin as part of the 14th resident crew.

The European Space Agency's Thomas Reiter, who has been in orbit for six months, will return with the Discovery crew.

''I can't wait to see my new home,'' Williams told astronaut Shannon Lucid at Mission Control as the crew awoke.

''Good morning to you Suni! You need to rise and shine because today is the day that you say, 'Goodbye shuttle and hello station,''' Lucid said.

The shuttle blasted off Saturday on NASA's first night-time launch since the 2003 Columbia accident.

Managers had suspended night launches to ensure its cameras would have good visibility to detect any debris-shedding problems with the shuttle's fuel tank, which triggered Columbia's demise.

After an initial assessment of images taken by ground and shuttle-based cameras and of radar that tracked the ship's climb to orbit, NASA was confident the shuttle reached orbit without any Columbia-like damage.

Columbia had been hit during launch hit by a chunk of insulating foam that smashed a hole in its wing. The shuttle broke apart as it flew through the atmosphere for landing 16 days later, killing all seven astronauts aboard.

Members of the shuttle crew spent their first day in orbit yesterday scanning Discovery's wings and nosecap for damage using a 100-foot boom outfitted with lasers and high-resolution cameras.

Before docking at the station, Discovery commander Mark Polansky will turn the shuttle's belly toward the outpost so the station crew can photograph the delicate heat tiles on the ship's underside.

During the shuttle's planned weeklong stay at the station, the crew plans to conduct three spacewalks to install a new truss segment and rewire the station's power grid.

REUTERS DKS PM0125