The space
shuttle Endeavour, the rescue ship for NASA's planned October mission to the
Hubble Space Telescope, moved a step closer to the launch pad Thursday as the
agency closed down its Houston-based astronaut training center to prepare for
an incoming hurricane.
Endeavour
rolled out of its processing hangar at NASA's Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in
Cape Canaveral, Fla., at 7:01 a.m. EDT (1101 GMT) and made the short trek to
the agency's cavernous Vehicle Assembly Building within an hour, KSC
spokesperson Candrea Thomas told SPACE.com.
"They'll
attach the orbiter to its external fuel tank and the solid rocket boosters on
the Mobile Launch Platform," Thomas said of the upcoming work. Engineers plan
to roll the spacecraft out of the 52-story Vehicle Assembly Building and on to
its seaside Pad 39B launch site on Sept. 18. The shuttle Atlantis is already
perched atop the nearby Pad 39A for its planned launch next month.
Endeavour
is slated to launch new
supplies and equipment to the International Space Station (ISS) for NASA's
STS-126 mission set to lift off on Nov. 12. But the shuttle is also pulling
double duty as a rescue ship for its sister ship Atlantis, which is currently
scheduled to launch seven astronauts on a final
service call to the Hubble Space Telescope on Oct. 10.
Because Atlantis
must fly in a higher orbit and different inclination than the space station to
reach Hubble, the shuttle will not be able to ferry its crew to the ISS to
await rescue if the spacecraft suffers critical damage. Instead, NASA is
preparing Endeavour and a minimal four-astronaut crew to launch a rescue
mission and retrieve the Atlantis crew in a series of three unprecedented shuttle-to-shuttle
spacewalks. Mission managers and Atlantis' STS-125 astronauts have said it
is extremely unlikely they'll ever need the plan, but it was vital to be
prepared.
Bracing
for Ike
While
engineers in Florida prepare Atlantis and Endeavour for their respective
launches, NASA officials closed the Johnson Space Center in Houston due to the
threat of violent weather associated with Hurricane Ike.
Currently a
Category 2 hurricane, Ike is centered about 470 miles (760 km) east-southeast
of Galveston, Texas, with maximum sustained winds reaching speeds of 100 mph
(160 kph), according to the National Hurricane Center. The storm is expected to
strengthen into a major hurricane before reaching the Texas gulf coast this
weekend, the center reported.
The Johnson
Space Center is home to NASA's astronaut training facilities and Mission
Control centers for space shuttle flights and the International Space Station. The
space station Mission Control was also closed, with back up teams in place near
Austin, Texas, and in Hunstville, Ala., NASA officials said.
The space
center's closure will require NASA to suspend training activities for the
STS-125 astronauts preparing for the Hubble
Space Telescope overhaul. It also delayed plans for a mission readiness
meeting originally targeted for today.
"The
closing prompted space shuttle program manager John Shannon to postpone until
sometime next week the STS-125 program-level Flight Readiness Review that had
been scheduled for today and Friday," NASA officials said in a status report.
Thomas said
that Atlantis' STS-125 crew is due to head to the Kennedy Space Center on Sept.
21 for several days of launch rehearsal training. Any scheduled changes due to
Hurricane Ike, if any, will be assessed next week, she added.
"We don't
know if it will have an impact, but for right now everything is still scheduled
the way that it was," Thomas said.
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