Astronauts arrive for practice countdown

The Atlantis astronauts aim to complete a critical training exercise at Kennedy Space Center this week while managers sort out the effects of Hurricane Ike and minor technical problems on an Oct. 10 target launch date.

Mission commander Scott Altman and his crew jetted to KSC for standard emergency training and a two-day practice countdown that will culminate Wednesday with a launch-day dress rehearsal.

The Terminal Countdown Demonstration Test -- or TCDT -- is carried out before every shuttle launch and is the last major training exercise at the launch site before astronauts embark on a mission.

In this case, the test almost serves as a way for the crew to refocus on the mission after Ike hammered the communities where they live near the Johnson Space Center.

"Some worse than others" is how Altman described how the astronauts fared during the hurricane. "But we're all still standing and looking forward to a nice distraction."

Altman and pilot Gregory "Ray J" Johnson aim to practice landings later tonight at the Shuttle Landing Facility. They'll fly a Gulfstream 2 aircraft modified to mimic the shuttle's brick-like descent to an airstrip -- one seven times steeper than a commercial airliner.

The crew will go through emergency training out at launch pad 39A, where Atlantis is being readied for flight. They'll get familiar with the launch tower escape system -- a 1,200-foot-long metal "slidewire" that would whisk the astronauts in baskets down to an emergency evacuation bunker on the western perimeter of the pad.

A media Q&A is scheduled at that bunker at 9:40 a.m. Tuesday and we'll webcast the live NASA TV broadcast here in The Flame Trench. Simply click the NASA TV box on the righthand side of our page to launch our NASA TV viewer.

The crew also includes five mission specialists: John Grunsfeld, Drew Feustel, Mike Massimino, Mike Good and Megan McArthur. All seven will don partial-pressure launch-and-entry suits on Wednesday and then board Atlantis for the last few hours of the practice countdown.

"It's great to be down here returning our focus from the hurricane that's behind us now to the flight that is in front of us," Altman said. "It's really great to be at this point looking forward instead of behind."

The target launch date will be reviewed this week during a shuttle program-level flight readiness review that will be held Wednesday and Thursday.

The date is expected to slip back as a result of the weeklong shutdown of the Johnson Space Center (which reopens Monday) and minor technical problems that have cropped up with the payload for the mission.

A firm launch date will be set at an executive-level flight readiness review on Oct. 3 and Oct. 4.

IMAGE NOTES: Click to enlarge and save the images captured by award-winning photographer Craig Rubadoux after the STS-125 crew arrived this evening at the Shuttle Landing Facility tonight. The first is a group shot that shows (left to right) Megan McArthur, Gregory Johnson, Mike Massimino, Scott Altman, Drew Feustel, John Grunsfeld and Mike Good. The second shows (left to right) McArthur, Feustel, Johnson, Altman and Good gathering for a quick photo opportunity. The last shows Altman climbing out of the T-38 jet he piloted to KSC.