Mission controllers Endeavour to achieve Monday launch

by Stevie Smith - Feb 8 2010, 04:34

NASA is in the process of fuelling the space shuttle Endeavour ahead of a possible Monday morning countdown, despite the chance of pesky weather conditions once again scuppering its launch plans.

Although moving to fill the shuttle’s massive external fuel tank indicates that the U.S. space administration expects to benefit from a gap in the weather, a spokesman said a 60 percent chance of launch-friendly conditions meant mission controllers were only “cautiously optimistic” of getting Endeavour away.

Low cloud cover aside, NASA has also said other weather-related concerns likely to contribute towards grounding the mission for a second time include high humidity, low temperatures of around 9 degrees Celsius, and also the chance of ice gathering on the external tank.

Endeavour’s original launch window of Sunday morning was scrubbed with only a matter of minutes left on the clock when a bank of low cloud moved over the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Once safely on its way, the Endeavour’s crew of six astronauts will embark on a 13-day mission to deliver and install the final U.S. module section to the orbiting International Space Station (ISS).

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