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Shuttle Endeavour prepped for fueling tonight BY WILLIAM HARWOOD STORY WRITTEN FOR CBS NEWS "SPACE PLACE" & USED WITH PERMISSION Posted: June 12, 2009 
A protective gantry was rolled away from the shuttle Endeavour today, exposing the orbiter to view atop launch pad 39A and setting the stage for fueling and liftoff Saturday on a space station assembly mission.
"They haven't had any kind of issues," said a NASA spokeswoman. "The weather has been fantastic." If all goes well, engineers will begin loading the shuttle's external tank with a half-million gallons of supercold liquid oxygen and hydrogen rocket fuel starting around 9:52 p.m. The three-hour process should be complete by around 12:52 a.m. Saturday when the countdown will go into a standard two-hour 30-minute hold at the T-minus three-hour mark. NASA television coverage is scheduled to begin at 2 a.m. and Endeavour's seven-member crew - commander Mark Polansky, pilot Douglas Hurley, Canadian flight engineer Julie Payette, David Wolf, Christopher Cassidy, Thomas Marshburn and space station flight engineer Timothy Kopra - plans to begin strapping in a few minutes before 4 a.m. Launch is targeted for 7:17:19 a.m., roughly the moment Earth's rotation carries the launch pad into the plane of the International Space Station's orbit. Forecasters are continuing to predict near-ideal weather for launch. Here is a timeline of countdown highlights (in EDT; best viewed with fixed-width font): EDT...........EVENT 12:00 PM......Final thermal protection system, debris inspection 12:00 PM......Ascent switch list configured 02:52 PM......Resume countdown 02:52 PM......Cockpit configured for launch 03:22 PM......Pad clear of non-essential personnel 03:12 PM......Hydraulic system bite test 04:02 PM......Fuel cell activation 04:52 PM......Booster joint heater activation 05:22 PM......Master events controller pre-flight bite test 05:37 PM......Tanking weather update 06:22 PM......Final fueling preps; launch area clear 06:52 PM......Red crew assembled 07:37 PM......Fuel cell integrity checks complete 07:52 PM......Begin 2-hour built-in hold (T-minus 6 hours) 08:02 PM......Safe-and-arm PIC test 08:52 PM......External tank ready for loading 09:15 PM......Mission management team tanking meeting 09:52 PM......Resume countdown (T-minus 6 hours) 09:52 PM......Liquid oxygen (LO2), liquid hydrogen (LH2) transfer line chilldown 10:02 PM......Main propulsion system chill down 10:02 PM......LH2 slow fill 10:32 PM......LO2 slow fill 10:37 PM......Hydrogen low-level sensors go wet 10:42 PM......LO2 fast fill 10:52 PM......LH2 fast fill Sat 06/13/09 12:47 AM......LH2 topping 12:52 AM......LH2 replenish 12:52 AM......LO2 replenish 12:52 AM......Begin 2-hour 30-minute built-in hold (T-minus 3 hours) 12:52 AM......Closeout crew to white room 12:52 AM......External tank in stable replenish mode 01:07 AM......Astronaut support personnel comm checks 01:37 AM......Pre-ingress switch reconfig 02:00 AM......NASA TV coverage begins 02:52 AM......Final crew weather briefing 02:57 AM......Crew suit up begins 03:22 AM......Resume countdown (T-minus 3 hours) 03:27 AM......Crew departs O&C building 03:57 AM......Crew ingress 04:47 AM......Astronaut comm checks 05:12 AM......Hatch closure 05:42 AM......White room closeout 06:02 AM......Begin 10-minute built-in hold (T-minus 20m) 06:12 AM......NASA test director countdown briefing 06:12 AM......Resume countdown (T-minus 20m) 06:13 AM......Backup flight computer to OPS 1 06:17 AM......KSC area clear to launch 06:23 AM......Begin final built-in hold (T-minus 9m) 06:53 AM......NTD launch status verification 07:08:19 AM...Resume countdown (T-minus 9m) 07:09:49 AM...Orbiter access arm retraction 07:12:19 AM...Launch window opens 07:12:19 AM...Hydraulic power system (APU) start 07:12:24 AM...Terminate LO2 replenish 07:13:19 AM...Purge sequence 4 hydraulic test 07:13:19 AM...IMUs to inertial 07:13:24 AM...Aerosurface test profile 07:13:49 AM...Main engine steering test 07:14:24 AM...LO2 tank pressurization 07:14:29 AM...Gaseous oxygen vent arm retraction 07:14:44 AM...Fuel cells to internal reactants 07:14:49 AM...Clear caution-and-warning memory 07:15:19 AM...Crew closes visors 07:15:22 AM...LH2 tank pressurization 07:16:29 AM...Orbiter to internal power 07:16:48 AM...Shuttle computers take control of countdown 07:16:58 AM...Booster steering test 07:17:12 AM...Main engine start (T-6.6 seconds) 07:17:19 AM...Booster ignition (LAUNCH)
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VIDEO:
TIME-LAPSE OF LAUNCH PAD TOWER ROLLBACK 