NASA aims to accelerate the
campaign to launch shuttle Atlantis in October by moving major pre-launch
milestones up about four days each, officials said Friday.
The 15-story external tank
designated for the mission will be mated to twin solid rocket boosters on Aug.
3 rather than Aug. 7, Kennedy Space Center spokeswoman Candrea Thomas said.
If all goes well, NASA
hopes to advance the orbiter's move to the Vehicle Assembly Building, and then
its rollout to launch pad 39A, by about the same amount of time.
Schedules still are under
evaluation, but in that case, the Atlantis move to the assembly building would
come around Aug. 18 rather than Aug. 22.
Rollout to the pad would
come around Aug. 25.
NASA wants to move
up its next two launches to make sure the second flies before a window of
opportunity closes in late November.
The Atlantis launch on a Hubble
Space Telescope servicing mission is scheduled for Oct. 8. Endeavour is
slated to launch Nov. 10 on an International Space Station outfitting mission.
Managers will meet Aug. 14
to see if earlier dates can be targeted.
The sun angle on the
station between Nov. 25 and Dec. 17 will be such that the outpost would not be
able to generate enough power, or dispel enough heat, to support a docked
shuttle mission.
NASA also would opt not to
launch during the Christmas or New Year's holidays.
That means Nov. 24 is
effectively the last day in 2008 to launch shuttle
missions to the station.
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