Sunita's sojourn on, Discovery docks with ISS

US space shuttle Discovery has docked with the International Space Station (ISS) after two days of orbital pursuit.

Flight Engineer Sunita Williams, the second Indian origin woman to venture into space after astronaut late Kalpana Chawla, will stay at the ISS for another six months.

The STS-116 crew entered the station at 0554 hrs CST to mark the start of joint operations with the Expedition 14 crew.

Later today, Sunita will replace German astronaut Thomas Reiter, who will return to earth with STS-116. The crew transfer becomes official when Williams' custom-made seatliner is installed in the Russian Soyuz spacecraft docked with the station.

"I've always wanted to fly a long-duration mission," said Indian-American Sunita, whose father Deepak Pandya is originally from India.

"A long-duration spaceflight will supply answers ... To what happens to the human body, how materials work in space."

Discovery's stated mission is to continue construction of the space station. Inside Discovery's payload bay is the P5 integrated truss structure. The STS-116 crew will conduct three spacewalks to install the P5 structure and to reconfigure and redistribute power generated by the station.