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Weather conditions postpone Endeavour launch 24 hours
BY WILLIAM HARWOOD
STORY WRITTEN FOR CBS NEWS "SPACE PLACE" & USED WITH PERMISSION
Posted: February 7, 2010


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Launch of the shuttle Endeavour on a space station assembly mission was delayed 24 hours, from Sunday to Monday, because of an unexpected deck of low clouds that swept over the Kennedy Space Center in the pre-dawn hours.


Credit: NASA TV
 
"We tried really, really hard to work the weather," Launch Director Mike Leinbach radioed commander George Zamka from the firing room. "It was just too dynamic. We got to feeling good there at one point and then it filled back in and we just were not comfortable launching a space shuttle tonight.

"So, we're going to go into a 24-hour scrub. Thank you all for the efforts you all put in tonight. We'll see you back again tomorrow night and we hope the weather's a little bit better."

"And Mike from Endeavour, we understand and we'll give it another try tomorrow night," Zamka replied.

Zamka and his crewmates - pilot Terry Virts, Kathryn Hire, flight engineer Stephen Robinson and spacewalkers Robert Behnken and Nicholas Patrick left the shuttle about an hour after the countdown was called off.

Forecasters are predicting a 60 percent chance of favorable weather Monday and Tuesday with the concern being low clouds over the Kennedy Space Center that could go broken and violate NASA's flight rules for an emergency return-to-launch-site abort and landing.

After discussing the forecast following Sunday's launch scrub, NASA managers opted to try again Monday. Assuming no other issues develop, engineers will begin fueling the shuttle around 6:45 p.m. Sunday, setting the stage for a launch attempt at 4:14:08 a.m. Monday.

The shuttle delay means a one-day slip for launch of NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory science satellite, from Tuesday to Wednesday, atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket. If Endeavour fails to get off the ground Monday, the shuttle flight will slip to Feb. 13, after the SDO mission.

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