Heavy rain and winds from Tropical Storm Alberto prompted shuttle Discovery's astronauts to scrap plans to fly to Kennedy Space Center today from their home base at Johnson Space Center in Houston.
The astronauts were scheduled to arrive at KSC about 6 p.m., but those plans were dashed by Alberto, the first named storm of the 2006 Atlantic hurricane season. Rain and winds from the storm began battering much of the west coast of Florida earlier today. The storm is expected to strengthen into a Category 1 hurricane by the time it makes landfall Tuesday.
The astronauts are scheduled to take part later this week in a two-day practice countdown for their planned July 1 launch on NASA's second post-Columbia test flight. Led by veteran astronaut Steve Lindsey, the crew will try to fly to KSC on Tuesday afternoon.
Image note: Refresh this page to see the latest image capture from a live feed of the NASA weather channel at Kennedy Space Center. It depicts rain associated with Tropical Storm Alberto.
Space news and analysis from Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral 
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