The astronauts of space shuttle Discovery’s STS-133 mission are practicing launch and ascent in the motion-based simulator at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston today. The simulator is an exact mock-up of the shuttle’s flight deck and lets the crew rehearse the steps they will take at liftoff and during the climb into orbit. At Kennedy Space Center in Florida, technicians are working on Discovery in Orbiter Processing Facility-3. They are to remove the shuttle’s right-side orbital maneuvering system pod this week. The shuttle uses the two OMS pods in space and the engines also act as braking thrusters to slow the shuttle for entry and landing at the end of the mission.