NASA still aims to launch shuttle Endeavour June 13, but the schedule leading up to liftoff is very tight and the agency will have just three days in which to launch before delaying until July 12.
Endeavour and seven astronauts remain scheduled to blast off from Kennedy Space Center's launch pad 39A at 7:17 a.m. June 13 on a mission to deliver the final segment of the Japanese Kibo science research facility to the International Space Station.
The shuttle is set to move from pad 39B to pad 39A on Saturday, clearing the way for preparations for the planned Aug. 30 Ares I-X test flight from pad 39B. An on-time roll-around is key to maintaining the June 13 launch date, NASA shuttle program manager John Shannon said today.
"If we are not able to do that roll, that would put our launch date in jeopardy," Shannon said.
In the past week, stormy weather has prompted NASA to delay delivery of Endeavour's payload to the launch pad. NASA also was forced to send Atlantis to a back-up landing site in California as a result of stormy weather.
The forecast from the Air Force 45th Space Wing Weather Squadron calls for mostly cloudy skies and a 40 percent chance of rain on Saturday morning. Endeavour is scheduled to start rolling off pad 39A at 12:01 a.m. Saturday and arrive on pad 39B six hours later.
NASA would have launch opportunities on June 14 and June 15 before standing down for the June 17 launch of the agency's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter on a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket at Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.
The U.S. Air Force Eastern Range, which provides tracking, range safety and weather forecasting services for all launches from KSC and Cape Canaveral, is scheduled to use June 16 as a prep day for the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter launch.
The moon mapper and a piggyback payload must be launched on precise trajectory, and that limits launch opportunities to short four-day periods about every two weeks. So NASA might opt to delay the Endeavour flight in order to get the lunar mission under way.
If the lunar mission is delayed for some reason, NASA would have another five launch opportunities -- June 16 through June 20 -- to send up Endeavour before a three-week period during which the shuttle cannot be launched to the station.
The sun angle on the International Space Station during that period would be such that the outpost could not generate enough electrical power or dispel enough heat to support a docked shuttle mission.
In that case, July 12 would be the next opportunity to launch Endeavour.
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