NASA managers wrapped up a two-day flight readiness review Thursday and formally cleared the shuttle Discovery for blastoff July 13 on the first post-Columbia shuttle mission. If all goes well, the countdown will begin at 6 p.m. July 10 for a launch attempt at 3:50:47 p.m. on July 13, weather permitting.
Shuttle program manager Bill Parsons said engineers still must close out open paper work and resolve a few last-minute issues, including questions about the age and certification of an actuator that drives the shuttle’s body flap.
Image above: At the Shuttle Landing Facility on NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, STS-114 Pilot James Kelly and Mission Commander Eileen Collins join support personnel after completing practice runs on the Shuttle Training Aircraft (STA). Image credit: NASA/KSC
One of my friends here at work is going down to visit his family for a few days in Orlando and expects to be there in time to see the shuttle launch. He says he can just plop a chair down in the cul-de-sac of the street as they have a clear view of the launch from there.
I’m a bit jealous… I’ve only watched one launch, that was on TV, and it was the Challenger shuttle on its final flight.
CAPE CANAVERAL - NASA flight controllers scrubbed the planned launch of the space shuttle Discovery today due to a glitch with the orbiter’s external tank.
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – NASA will restart the countdown for the space shuttle Discovery Saturday, with plans to launch the orbiter spaceward on July 26 after more than week of work to pin down a fuel sensor glitch, mission managers said late Wednesday.
“Right now we think we have eliminated all the common causes,” shuttle program manager Bill Parsons said of the glitch during a press briefing here at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center (KSC). “We believe we’ve done everything we possible could on the vehicle.”
Discovery’s STS-114 mission, NASA’s first shuttle flight since the 2003 Columbia disaster, is now set to launch at 10:39 a.m. EDT (1439 GMT) on July 26.
A successfull launch by the looks of things, even though I’m not American I always fill with a sense of pride and awe when watching the space shuttle launches.
Amazing, I want one for crimble:nod:
Good luck to all aboard, may you have a safe flight and sucessfull mission.
After two scrubbed attempts, Discovery shot spaceward at 2:37:55 p.m. EDT (1837:55 GMT) from Pad 39B here at Kennedy Space Center (KSC). The launch marked NASA’s first-ever shuttle flight to leave Earth on Independence Day.
Mission Specialists Piers Sellers and Mike Fossum successfully completed STS-121’s first spacewalk at 4:49 p.m. EDT today. The excursion outside Space Shuttle Discovery and the International Space Station featured two major scheduled tasks.
Casting Off: Shuttle Discovery Undocks from Space Station
HOUSTON – Six NASA astronauts began their homeward trek Saturday as their Discovery orbiter cast off from the International Space Station (ISS) following eight days of orbital work.
Discovery’s STS-121 astronauts took some final parting snapshots before they shut the hatches linking their spacecraft to the ISS at about 4:00 a.m. EDT (0800 GMT).
Discovery is slated to land in Cape Canaveral, Florida at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center on July 17 at about 9:14 a.m. EDT (1314 GMT).
so look ar your local TV-Programme
CEST = GMT + 02:00 (Central Europe Daylight / Summer Time)
How has everyone been? Sorry I have been soooo inactive on the boards. Been crunching the whole time though 
