A fuel leak in ground support equipment at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station's Launch Complex 17B has scrubbed this morning's planned launch of two missile defense demonstration satellites. The launch has been pushed back at least one day, to no earlier than Friday at 8 a.m.
A first attempt Wednesday scrubbed because of heavy clouds near the Cape.
The small fuel leak was discovered in a line that transfers RP-1 rocket fuel to the United Launch Alliance Delta II rocket.
NASA said there are no problems with the rocket or two Northrop Grumman-built spacecraft perched on top of it.
The launch had already been delayed from Sept. 15 because of weather and tests to ensure proper communications between the spacecraft and a control center in Colorado Springs.
The satellites are technology demonstrators for the Missile Defense Agency's Space Tracking and Surveillance System, or STSS, designed to follow ballistic missiles from launch through their entire flight and to pass accurate tracking information to interceptors.
An Air Force weather forcecast issued Wednesday shows a 70-percent chance of conditions favorable for launch on Friday, slightly better than today's 60-percent chance.
IMAGE NOTE: On Launch Pad 17-B at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on Wednesday, the Space Tracking and Surveillance System Demonstrator spacecraft waits for launch under dark, cloudy sky. Rain over Central Florida's east coast caused the scrub of the launch. STSS Demo is a space-based sensor component of a layered Ballistic Missile Defense System designed for the overall mission of detection, tracking and discriminating ballistic missiles. STSS is capable of tracking objects after boost phase and provides trajectory information to other sensors. Photo credit: NASA/Jack Pfaller
2 comments:
Maybe you should get "Spell Check" for for headline!
Anonymous: unfortunately the blog's spell checker does not include the headlines. Sorry about that one. Hadn't had enough coffee to see straight, I guess. I hate launch scurbs, don't you?
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