Thu, Feb 21, 2008
STS-124 Targeted For Nighttime Liftoff
With the shuttle Atlantis back home safe, and Endeavour ready at
the launch pad for launch early month, on Wednesday NASA announced
it is now targeting May 25 at 1926 EDT for the launch of the space
shuttle Discovery's STS-124 mission from the Kennedy Space Center
in Florida -- over one month later than originally planned.
As ANN reported, NASA
announced last week it had rescheduled the last three shuttle
missions for 2008, and it would hold off determining dates for the
next two launches until Atlantis had returned.
Discovery's flight was originally targeted for April 24.
However, fuel sensor system repair work on STS-122 and STS-123
delayed final preparations of Discovery's external fuel tank, and
the tank is not expected to arrive at Kennedy until early
March.
Furthermore, the shuttle can't launch to the International Space
Station between May 7 and 25 because the angle of the sun with
respect to the plane of the station's orbit is too high to generate
sufficient solar power for the mission.
The space agency stressed the delay to Discovery's launch date
will not affect the remainder of the shuttle manifest, which is
pushing against a hard September 30, 2010 retirement deadline.
Shuttle and station program officials will continue to evaluate
Discovery's liftoff date and are protecting the option to launch
the shuttle a few days earlier.
During the mission to the space station, the shuttle and its
seven-member crew will deliver the pressurized module and the
robotic arm of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's Kibo
laboratory.
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