Posted on 11/19/2010 5:03:05 PM PST by ErnstStavroBlofeld
With repairs to the fuel tank of the shuttle Discovery still underway, NASA shuttle program managers on Nov. 18 retargeted the earliest date for a second round of launch opportunities for the agency’s senior orbiter from Nov. 30 to Dec. 3.
The delay will permit more time for agency managers to establish flight rationale using the repaired fuel tank.
The upcoming launch period will close three days later to permit a Dec. 15 Soyuz launching with three U.S., Russian and European space station crewmembers.
Other station activities and shuttle thermal control system restrictions are steering the opening of the next launch period toward late February.
Meanwhile, technicians at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center applied doublers to a pair of cracked external fuel tank stringers Nov. 18, following a successful high-pressure check of a replacement for the leaky Ground Umbilical Carrier Plate that played a role in Discovery’s launch scrub earlier this month.
(Excerpt) Read more at aviationweek.com ...
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