CAPE
CANAVERAL, Fla. - Stormy weather in Florida prompted NASA to forgo the first of
two landing attempts for the space shuttle Atlantis today, giving the seven
astronauts aboard the spacecraft one more chance to return home on time.
Atlantis
commander Scott Altman and his crew hoped to land here at NASA's Kennedy Space
Center at about 10:00 a.m. EDT (1400 GMT), but Mother Nature isn't
cooperating. Instead, NASA will target an 11:39 a.m. EDT (1539 GMT) return
for the crew, the only remaining chance for a shuttle landing today.
"The
weather just is not clearing up at this point," Mission Control called up to
Atlantis. Thick clouds and lightning could be seen at the time over NASA
spaceport, which has been battered by rain in recent days.
Mission
Control radioed the astronauts early, before sunrise, to break the news so they
could avoid donning their bulky orange pressure suits and other chores.
"We
appreciate the early call," Altman said, adding that he'll take a look at the
weather over Florida from space. "We'll see what it looks like as we go by."
Altman and
his crew launched May 11 and are returning to Earth to end an 11-day
service call on the Hubble Space Telescope. The astronauts performed five
back-to-back spacewalks in as many days to make repairs and upgrades that left the
19-year-old Hubble more
powerful than ever.
It was
NASA's fifth, and last, mission to Hubble before retiring its three-shuttle
fleet next year and is expected to extend the iconic
observatory's life through at least 2014.
If Atlantis
cannot land today, NASA can try again on Saturday, when it would call up a
backup runway at the Edwards Air Force Base in Southern California. The first
Florida landing opportunity is at 9:16 a.m. EDT (1316 GMT), with the first
window in California opening about 90 minutes later.
In all, the
shuttle would have two chances to land at each of the Florida and California
runways, NASA officials said.
NASA
prefers to land space shuttles at the Kennedy Space Center because it is the
home port and launch site for the fleet. It also saves about $1.8 million and a week
of time required to return a shuttle from its backup runway in California to
Florida using NASA's modified 747 jumbo jet transport craft.
SPACE.com
is providing continuous coverage of NASA's last mission to the Hubble Space
Telescope with senior editor Tariq Malik at the Cape Canaveral, Fla., and
reporter Clara Moskowitz in New York. Click here for landing
coverage, mission updates and SPACE.com's live NASA TV video feed.
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