After nearly a month of delays, the space shuttle Endeavour is now slated for a July 11 launch toward the International Space Station after a hydrogen gas leak prevented two earlier attempts. The shuttle is slated to blast off from Launch Pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., at 7:39 p.m. EDT (2339 GMT).
Mission Description from NASA:
"Endeavour's flight will deliver the final components of the Japan Aerospace Exploration
Agency's (JAXA) Kibo laboratory to the International Space Station. The 16-day mission will
include five spacewalks and the installation of two platforms outside of the Japanese module.
One platform is permanent and will serve as a type of porch for experiments that require direct
exposure to space. The other is an experiment storage palette that will be detached and returned
with the shuttle. During the mission, Kibo's robotic arm will exchange three experiments
from the palette to the platform. Future experiments also can be transfer to the platform from
the inside using the laboratory's airlock. Endeavour also will deliver a new crew member and
bring back another after more than three months aboard the station."
Veteran astronaut Mark Polansky is commanding Endeavour's STS-127 mission. Astronaut Doug Hurley serves as pilot with mission specialists Chris Cassidy, Julie Payette of Canada, Tom Marshburn, Dave Wolf and Tim Kopra rounding out the crew. Kopra will replace Japanese astroanut Koichi Wakata aboard the International Space Station as a member of its first full 6-person crew.
Endeavour has a slim four-day launch window that closes on July 14 to allow a previously scheduled unmanned Russian cargo ship to launch and dock at the space station. The next opportunity to fly would come on July 27, mission managers have said.
Click here for live launch and mission coverage.
Tariq Malik, SPACE.com Senior Editor
