Entry flight director Leroy Cain says the shuttle Atlantis is in good shape for landing Friday and with forecasters predicting ideal weather, the astronauts appear to be on track for an on-time Kennedy Space Center touchdown at 12:26:21 p.m. EDT (1626:21 GMT).

"We did our flight control system checkout, we did the reaction control system hotfire with all the thrusters, we did some tests with the GPS, all of that was completely nominal, we had no problems," Cain said of this morning's day-before-entry tests and checkout procedures.

Forecasters are predicting scattered clouds at 4,000 feet and 20,000 feet and winds out of the east (100 degrees) at six knots, gusting to 10 knots. That translates into a crosswind of about eight knots on the shuttle runway and headwinds/tailwinds of just six knots, all well within NASA's safety limits.

"That's a really good looking 'go' forecast," Cain said. "We have a pretty good forecast for KSC on Saturday and it's a little too early to tell for Sunday. We basically have a real good vehicle on orbit, it's been a very clean vehicle the entire mission ... and currently the weather forecast looks good for tomorrow."

The shuttle's backup landing site at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., will not be staffed Friday. But if Atlantis fails to make it back to Earth for some reason, Edwards likely would be staffed Saturday for subsequent landing attempts.

Atlantis has enough rocket fuel and on-board supplies to remain in orbit until Monday in a worst-case scenario. Two landing opportunities in Florida and two in California are available each day. But given the current forecast for Florida, an Edwards landing appears very unlikely.