Shuttle is Go For Launch, But is the Weather?

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With the fuel leak apparently fixed, space shuttle Endeavour is ‘”go” for launch for the STS-127 mission. But the weather could force another delay. Forecasters predict a 60 percent chance thunderstorms on Saturday evening at Kennedy Space Center, and Endeavour’s launch is scheduled for 7:39:35 p.m. EDT. “Bottom line from the team, everybody’s go for launch, we have no major issues at all,” said Mike Moses, director of shuttle launch integration at the Kennedy Space Center. “We’re in really good shape for launch. We do have some challenges with the weather, but we’ll just work through those.”

Two previous launch attempts on June 13 and 17 were scrubbed when a hydrogen vent line attached to the side of the tank began leaking during fueling. NASA engineers replaced a one-piece Teflon seal with a different and more flexible two-piece seal, and in a fueling test on July 1, no leaks were detected.

The 16-day mission will feature five spacewalks and complete construction of the Japanese Kibo laboratory, adding a platform to the outside of the module that will allow experiments to be exposed to space.
Endeavour’s crew consists of commander Mark Polansky, pilot Douglas Hurley, Canadian flight engineer Julie Payette, David Wolf, Christopher Cassidy, Thomas Marshburn and space station flight engineer Timothy Kopra .