Posted on 01/17/2006 8:36:57 AM PST by Textide
The launch is scheduled from Cape Canaveral, FL at 1:14pm Eastern.
Spaceflightnow.com Mission Status
As another freeper posted a few days ago, they should be glad that we're ridding the Earth of the stuff
I'm sure the FReeper experts will answer this better than I, but one factor is that Apollo 11 had to decelerate in order to achieve Lunar orbit. It would have been a bit rough on it to come to a screeching halt :)
A heartwarming story that I heard yesterday is that the widow of the man who discovered Pluto will be present for the launch. She is age 93!!
The first stage liquid oxygen tank is 80 percent full, Centaur liquid hydrogen tank is reached the 60 percent mark and the Centaur oxygen tank is already fully loaded.
1724 GMT (12:24 p.m. EST)
Launch is now just 60 minutes away.
1720 GMT (12:20 p.m. EST)
The first stage liquid oxygen tank is now 70 percent full.
1719 GMT (12:19 p.m. EST)
The Centaur liquid hydrogen tank has reached the 20 percent level. The cryogenic propellant will be consumed with liquid oxygen by the stage's Pratt & Whitney-made RL10 engine.
1719 GMT (12:19 p.m. EST)
The flight control final preparations are starting.
1715 GMT (12:15 p.m. EST)
Winds at Complex 41 are steady at about 25 knots. Gusts have been reaching 35 knots. The launch time limit is 33 knots.
“They finally are going! I can’t believe it!” said Patricia Tombaugh, 93, widow of Clyde Tombaugh, the Illinois-born astronomer who discovered Pluto in 1930.
Found a good article that she wrote about her husband. http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/news_center/news/103105.htm
Awwww...that *is* a nice article. And wow...Flagstaff with pop. 4,000. That's a nice observatory up there.
ping to myself lol!
Wow, I just read an article about him in the last few weeks.
T minus 18 minutes!
Here's some more links. Thanks for the thread.
http://countdown.ksc.nasa.gov/elv/public/
T minus 4 minutes!
Holding at T minus 4 minutes. I believe the hold will be for 10 minutes in duration. Final launch will be at 1:24 PM EST.
New launch time: 1345 EST.
crud.
technical issue and wind
Sounds like they're ok with the LOX fill/drain valve now. But the winds still might be an issue.
I'm just assuming here, but there's probably a lot less weight to deal with here than there was in Apollo.
http://www.spaceflightnow.com/atlas/av010/status.html
oops--now I see this link in the article head--
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