Good morning friends. Rain or shine, the crew of the US space shuttle Atlantis will have to attempt to land Sunday after bad weather forced delays in their return to Earth for two consecutive days.
NASA officials, however, may have to land the orbiter in California, on the other side of the country than initially planned.
On Saturday, heavy cloud cover and crosswinds forced the US space agency to put off the space shuttle Atlantis' return to Earth for at least another day, extending an otherwise successful mission to repair the Hubble telescope.
NASA had hoped to land the shuttle at Kennedy Space Centre in Florida, but the weather did not cooperate, waving off landing for a second straight day. The crew has enough fuel to fly until Monday at the latest.
"The forecast for tomorrow is slightly better," Allard Beutel, a spokesman for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, told AFP. The US space agency has prepared Edwards Air Force Base in California as a back-up landing point in case conditions do not clear up in Florida.
"There's a chance for a landing at Kennedy tomorrow, and we're going to keep that option open," said Greg Johnson, another NASA spokesman. "Edwards remains good for tomorrow and Monday, if needed."
The first chance to land at the Kennedy Space Center on Sunday is at 10:11 am (1411 GMT), he said. A second window of opportunity will appear nearly an hour and a half later -- at 11:40 am (15:40 GMT) in California -- and a third just nine minutes later: at 11:49 am (1549 GMT) in Florida.
NASA would prefer to land the shuttle at the Kennedy Space Center as it would cost the agency some two million dollars (1.4 million euros) extra to get the craft back home from Edwards Air Force Base.
Atlantis blasted off on May 11 with a crew of seven astronauts on what was scheduled to be an 11-day mission to repair the Hubble space telescope and extend its range and life for another five years. "They have enough supplies to stay on board until Monday. But we don't like to wait until the last moment," Beutel said. –The Times of India
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