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Stormy Weather Grounds Endeavour, NASA Considers Weekend Launch Options
By Kelly Young
FLORIDA TODAY
posted: 12:00 pm ET
31 May 2002
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CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- NASA will decide Friday evening when to reschedule shuttle Endeavour's launch after delaying lift off for a second day Friday morning. NASA officials postponed the launch during their morning meeting when they were to decide whether to load propellant into the shuttle's orange external tank. There was only a 20 percent chance of good weather at 7:22 p.m. EDT (2322 GMT), the scheduled launch time. This weather system also brings with it a chance of hail, so workers will move back the protective gantry, called the Rotating Service Structure, to cover the shuttle during the storm. Mission managers will decide when to make the next launch attempt at a meeting at 7:30 p.m. EDT (2330 GMT) today. The bad weather does not look like it will clear up until early next week. There is a 30 percent chance of acceptable launch weather on Saturday. Anvil-shaped storms, which formed west of Orlando Thurday, drifted toward Kennedy Space Center during the afternoon, getting close enough to scrub the early-evening flight. "There are multiple sources of anvils, so that's a bad sign," said Lt. Tom Crenshaw, an Air Force weather officer. "It's a very dynamic day out there." In addition, shuttle managers worked through a technical issue during the last hour of the countdown. Endeavour's left-hand orbital maneuvering system engine had a gaeous nitrogen pressure regulator that showed higher-than-normal readings. Managers stabilized it minutes before launch, but they weren't sure it would hold at that level. It stayed stable, and managers monitored it through the next few minutes of the countdown. The problem is believed solved and no further work was planned on the regulator, said NASA launch commentator Bruce Buckingham. The shuttle was to begin a 12-day mission to the International Space Station to add supplies and bring a new crew. The delay will mean station astronauts Dan Bursch and Carl Walz will break Shannon Lucid's record for the most consecutive days spent by an American in space. Lucid spent 188 days and four hours in space during 1996 when she served a tour of duty aboard the Russian space station Mir. Walz and Bursch, along with Russian commander Yuri Onufrienko, have been in space since December. NASA normally plans for astronauts to stay on the station between 120 and 180 days. "There's nothing magic about the 180-day time frame," said Bill Gerstenmaier, NASA's deputy program manger for the space station. "It's just where our experience base is." Published under license from FLORIDA TODAY. Copyright © 2002 FLORIDA TODAY. No portion of this material may be reproduced in any way without the written consent of FLORIDA TODAY.
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