CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. Shuttle Atlantis rollout to a Kennedy Space Center launch pad is being delayed, increasing the likelihood that NASAs next mission to the International Space Station will be postponed yet again.
Atlantis and a crew of five astronauts are tentatively scheduled to launch July 7 on a mission to deliver a $164 million airlock to the frontier outpost.
Now mounted on a launch platform and equipped with an external tank and attached solid rocket boosters, the shuttle had been slated to move Tuesday from KSCs 52-story Vehicle Assembly Building to launch pad 39A.
The 3.5-mile trip, however, is being delayed to give engineers more time to sort out ongoing problems with the stations new $600 million Canadian robot arm, which is required to put the airlock in place at the outpost.
Problems with the arms shoulder joint already prompted NASA to delay a tentatively scheduled June 20 Atlantis launch.
KSC spokesman Joel Wells said no new date has been set for the shuttles move to the pad. With little or no extra time built in to a launch pad work schedule, however, its likely that the planned July 7 launch will be pushed back if the rollout is delayed beyond this week.
NASA, meanwhile, is facing a mid-July deadline for launching the Atlantis mission.
The flight cannot be launched between July 17 and August 4. The station during that time will be flying in an orbit that would expose a docked shuttle to high temperatures that could foul spaceship systems.
Consequently, a significant delay in the Atlantis rollout might prompt NASA to reverse the order of its next two shuttle missions to the station.
In that case, shuttle Discovery would blast off around Aug. 5 on a mission to ferry a new crew to the station and return to Earth with its current tenants: Outpost commander Yuri Usachev and flight engineers Susan Helms and Jim Voss.
The Atlantis mission then would follow in September.
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