shuttle

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla.--Running two weeks late because of an electrical glitch, the repaired shuttle Endeavour finally blasted off and rocketed into orbit for the last time Monday, putting on a spectacular, if brief, show for the several hundred thousand spectators who were estimated to have come to watch NASA's next-to-last shuttle launch.

Carrying a $2 billion particle physics experiment, critical supplies, and spare parts bound for the International Space Station, Endeavour's three main engines flashed to life and throttled up to full power while computers monitored their performance 50 times per second.

Six-and-a-half seconds later, at … Read more

NASA said today that it has decided to push back the final launch of the space shuttle Endeavour until at least May 16. This is the third delay since the shuttle's April 29 launch was scrubbed due to problems with its hydraulic systems.

In a release, NASA said that Endeavour will launch no earlier than May 16. After the April 29 scrubbing, the agency targeted May 2, then May 8, and now mid-May at the earliest. NASA managers have got to be worried that each subsequent delay is threatening the space shuttle program's last-ever launch, that of Atlantis, … Read more

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla.--Engineers have traced an electrical problem blamed for grounding the shuttle Endeavour Friday to a power distribution box in the ship's engine compartment, officials said today. Replacing the box will delay launch until at least May 8--Mother's Day--and possibly later.

"I'm here to disappoint everybody by saying I'm not going to tell you what the new launch date is because I have no idea," Mike Moses, chairman of NASA's Mission Management Team, told reporters after engineers decided on a course of action. "We have a lot to evaluate, both the work to do, the R & R (removal and replacement), the retest that has to be done, how we work all that schedule in.

"But we can tell you pretty much it's not going to be any earlier than the 8th. That doesn't mean we're going to go launch on the 8th, that just means we know right now the 8th is our next available opening," he said.

Launch Director Mike Leinbach said engineers plan to remove the suspect aft load control assembly--ALCA-2--box from Endeavour's cramped engine compartment tomorrow, install a replacement Tuesday and get into a complex re-test procedure Tuesday night or early Wednesday.

To make a launch at 12:09:17 p.m. EDT on May 8, NASA would have to start a fresh three-day countdown around 10:30 a.m. Thursday. Whether the team can complete the ALCA-2 swap-out and re-test in time remains to be seen.… Read more

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla.--An electrical glitch with the shuttle Endeavour's hydraulic power system forced NASA managers to scrub today's planned launch on a space station assembly mission, disappointing thousands of spectators and spoiling a visit by President Obama and his family.

It also was a disappointment to commander Mark Kelly's wife, U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.), who flew to Florida on Wednesday to watch the launch. Giffords has been recovering after being shot in the head during a shooting in January.

"But as we always say in this business, we will not fly this machine until it's ready," said Launch Director Mike Leinbach. "And today, it was not ready to go."

NASA managers do not yet know what it will take to resolve the problem, but they are hopeful a faulty thermostat in a heater circuit is to blame. If so, the shuttle could be ready for another launch attempt as early as Monday at 2:33:56 p.m. EDT.

But if the problem requires a cockpit fuse panel swap out, or installation of a replacement electrical box in the shuttle's aft engine compartment, Endeavour's launch on its 25th and final mission likely will be delayed until May 9 or 10, after the planned May 6 launch of an Atlas rocket carrying a missile early-warning satellite.… Read more

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla.--Ending months of suspense, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden today announced the winners of a national competition to display the agency's three space shuttles after the fleet is retired and decommissioned later this year, choosing sites in Florida, California, and, as expected, the Washington, D.C., area.

Speaking on the 30th anniversary of the first shuttle flight on April 12, 1981, Bolden said the shuttle Discovery, NASA's senior orbiter, will be displayed near Washington at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum's Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center.

The shuttle Atlantis will remain at the Kennedy … Read more

Thirty years on, NASA's space shuttle program is now in its last lap, but its place in history is assured.

On the morning of April 12, 1981, the shuttle Columbia, strapped to an enormous external fuel tank and a pair of solid rocket boosters, lifted off on its maiden voyage--and launched a new era in the Space Age. Never before had there been a spacecraft that could be used over and over again, that could land on Earth like an airplane--a glider, specifically.

That flight lasted 2 days, 6 hours, 20 minutes, and 53 seconds, in which time … Read more

Links from Thursday's episode of Loaded:

Mozilla ready for Release Candidate 4 test

IE9 gets a release date

Cloud saving coming to PS3

Kinect breaks iPad sales records

New Apple iOS 4.3 now available

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla.--Enduring the heat of re-entry one last time, the shuttle Discovery dropped out of orbit and returned to Earth today to wrap up a near-flawless 39th and final mission, marking the beginning of the end for NASA's winged rocket ships.

After firing its twin braking rockets for a computer-controlled descent halfway around the planet, commander Steven Lindsey took over manual control and guided Discovery through a 250-degree left turn to line up on runway 15.

Pilot Eric Boe then deployed the ship's landing gear and the 204,000-pound shuttle swooped to a tire-smoking touchdown … Read more

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla.--The crew of the shuttle Discovery, given a "Star Trek" send off by actor William Shatner, undocked from the International Space Station early today to close out an extended assembly and resupply mission, the shuttle's 13th and final visit to the orbital outpost.

With pilot Eric Boe at the controls, Discovery's docking system disengaged from the station's forward port at 7 a.m. ET as the two spacecraft sailed through orbital darkness above the western Pacific Ocean northeast of Australia.

"Houston and station, physical separation," commander Steven Lindsey called … Read more