CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- The oxygen-leak problem aboard shuttle Endeavour was compounded Tuesday when workers looking for its source damaged the blanket that insulates the shuttle's robotic arm.
The worry is that the arm itself could be damaged, NASA spokesman Bruce Buckingham said Tuesday night. That possibility is being investigated. "It's not a major process to reinstall the blanket, since we've already got access to it right there," he said.
Shuttle mission managers already were planning to discuss today whether the new girder for the International Space Station must be removed from Endeavour's payload bay to fix the oxygen leak.
Removing the 14-ton port-side truss would mean Monday's target launch, between 7 and 11 p.m, could be put off by several days. Complicated repairs to the robotic arm could have the same effect.
Workers opened the shuttle's payload-bay doors Tuesday and rode a platform up to the forward end of the cargo bay to begin inspections.
"It was the platform that made contact with the thermal protective blankets that cover the arm," Buckingham said.
Once they were in place, between the truss and docking mechanism, the workers searched for the source of an oxygen leak detected in the orbiter's mid-body Sunday night that forced the launch delay.
Their hope was to complete repairs without having to move the cargo. "If we can do that, then we can stay on track for Monday night," Buckingham said. "They're working around the clock," he said.
Endeavour needs to launch as soon as it is ready because NASA could be running out of acceptable dates to fly this year. For about two weeks in mid-December, the sun, Earth and station are in such a position that the sun shines on the station during its entire orbit.
The station can shift position to protect itself from the extreme temperatures, but the shuttle can't be docked there during the so-called beta-angle period.
NASA, then, must launch Endeavour before the end of November if it wants to get a shuttle to the station before Christmas.
The Expedition Five station crew, which is set to return home aboard Endeavour, already has been living in space for five months.
The oxygen in the shuttle's Environmental Control and Life Support System is fed to the astronauts' suits during launch and descent and to the cabin during the remainder of the mission. Two systems feed oxygen to the cockpit. Only one apparently had a leak, but it was feared the other wouldn't be enough to handle the load.
"They are redundant, they're completely isolatable from each other, but typically, both for ascent and entry, we tie them all together," shuttle program manager Ron Dittemore said in a news conference after the delay was announced.
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