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CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - The crews of the space shuttle and station said a teary farewell, then sealed the hatches between them Sunday after more than a week of working tirelessly together to build a bigger and better scientific outpost in orbit. Atlantis was scheduled to undock early Monday, its load considerably lighter than when it arrived Feb. 9 with Europe's premiere space laboratory, Columbus. Astronaut Daniel Tani was especially emotional as he left the international space station, his home for the past four months. Before floating into Atlantis for his long-overdue ride home, Tani paid tribute to his mother,...

Drudge has link up that German astronaut is ill. No details, and no news source up yet.

<p>Press conference just concluded (15:31 hrs CDT) today. Very contentious questions about the health of a space-walker, delay of space walk due to illness, and overall health of crew(s).</p>

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) - After two months of delay, shuttle Atlantis blasted off Thursday with Europe's gift to the international space station, a $2 billion science lab named Columbus that spent years waiting to set sail. Atlantis and its seven-man crew roared away from their seaside launch pad at 2:45 p.m., overcoming fuel gauge problems that thwarted back- to-back launch attempts in December. The same cold front that spawned killer tornadoes across the South earlier in the week stayed far enough away and, in the end, cut NASA a break. All week, bad weather had threatened to delay the...

This is the official thread of the Space Shuttle Atlantis.

WASHINGTON (AFP) - The space shuttle Atlantis is tentatively set to launch February 7 on a mission to the International Space Station carrying the European lab Columbus, NASA said. "The team did a great job to isolate where (the cutting engine sensor) failure were (so that) the failure would not occur again," Bill Gerstenmayer, deputy administrator for space programs told reporters Wednesday. Gerstenmayer said that as "we head for the 7th of February for launch and we continue to follow the radiator retract hose over the next couple of days; there is a lot of work out to be done...

MMT decide to try for a Sunday launch attempt for STS-122 The Mission Management Team (MMT) have concluded their meeting on flight rationale for proceeding with the launch of Shuttle Atlantis on STS-122, deciding to make a launch attempt on Sunday at 3:21pm Eastern, in a one minute launch window. The main reason for waiting an extra day would be to finalize Flight Controller procedures for watching the tank closely during ascent, in the event of ECO (Engine Cut Off) sensors were deemed unreliable. The launch could be delayed longer if those procedures are not finalized.

This the official Space Shuttle Launch live thread.. Note, there is a former professional football player...

NASA managers today cleared the shuttle Atlantis and its crew for blastoff Dec. 6 on a long-awaited flight to attach the European Space Agency's Columbus research lab to the international space station. With commander Steve Frick and pilot Alan Poindexter at the controls, Atlantis is scheduled to lift off from pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center at 4:31:44 p.m. next Thursday, roughly the moment when Earth's rotation carries the launch pad into the plane of the space station's orbit. "We have had three outstanding flights of the space shuttle so far this year and we're looking forward to a...

CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) - NASA moved space shuttle Atlantis to its seaside launch pad on Saturday ahead of a planned early December mission to get Europe's first permanent space laboratory into orbit. Riding on top of a 3,000-ton Apollo-era crawler transporter, Atlantis left the Kennedy Space Center's massive assembly building before dawn. The 3.8-mile trek took about five hours. For a change, NASA has time to spare in its campaign to prepare the shuttle for the three-day launch countdown beginning on December 3. Whether the International Space Station will be ready for Atlantis' arrival is another question. Station commander...

EDWARDS AFB - Technical issues delayed Saturday's scheduled departure of Space Shuttle Atlantis from NASA Dryden Flight Research Center. Shuttle officials said technicians ran into difficulty while mounting the shuttle atop the modified 747 that will ferry it to Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Atlantis had been "soft-mated" on three supports atop the jet Friday night, but problems with alignment slowed the final lock-down of the connections. "Engineers and technicians are meeting to discuss their options for completing the mounting of the shuttle to the 747," a statement from NASA Dryden said. The joined vehicles could depart as early as...

Let try it again.. The first landing attempt will be at the cape at 2:18 pm est at the Cape. Details of the launch can be found at Spaceflightnow.com.

Well it was a good mission despite the minor setback... The Shuttle will be landing at the Cape at 1:54 pm edt. Details about the landing can be viewed here at Spaceflightnow

Astronaut John (Danny) Olivas used a surgical stapler and some stainless steel pins to tack down a ripped piece of thermal blanket on the tail of the space shuttle Atlantis June 15, easing concerns the damage could endanger the orbiter on re-entry or delay its turnaround on the ground. Mounted in a foot restraint on the shuttle's robot arm, which was extended the full length of the cargo bay, Olivas carefully used his gloved hand to poke the blanket section on the left Orbital Maneuvering System (OMS) pod back into place where it had pulled up from an adjacent row...

Hoping for the best, space station commander Fyodor Yurchikhin and flight engineer Oleg Kotov hot wired two computers aboard the international space station today that engineers had feared were victims of fatal power supply failures. To everyone's delight, the machines promptly booted up and appeared to be running normally, two more successes in an improbable recovery from crippling computer crashes last week. Two of the three computers making up the Russian segment's guidance, navigation and control computers, along with two of three central control computers, were successfully revived Friday when Yurchikhin and Kotov used jumper cables to bypass suspect surge...

HOUSTON (AP) - Russian cosmonauts on Saturday began turning back on some crucial systems that had been shut down more than four days ago when a computer system on the Russian side of the international space station crashed. The first system turned on was a machine that scrubs carbon dioxide from the air inside the space station. Just a day earlier, Fyodor Yurchikhin and Oleg Kotov were able to get four of six processors on two computers working again by using a cable to bypass a circuit board. It took four days to restore the capability of the computers. “In...

HOUSTON - Russian computers that control the international space station's orientation and supply of oxygen and water have failed, potentially extending the space shuttle's mission — or cutting it short. Russian engineers aren't sure why the computers stopped working. A failure of this type has never occurred before on the space station. The station is operated primarily by the Russian and U.S. space agencies, with contributions from the Canadian, European and Japanese space agencies. "We have plenty of resources, so we have plenty of time to sort this out," said Mike Suffredini, NASA manager of the space station program. But...

Space Shuttle's Left Wing May Be Damaged Meteorite, Space Junk May Have Struck Panels POSTED: 5:13 pm EDT June 12, 2007 UPDATED: 7:00 pm EDT June 12, 2007 Email This Story | Print This Story Sign Up for Breaking News Alerts WASHINGTON -- A meteorite or space junk may have struck Space Shuttle Atlantis' left wing, according to NBC News space correspondent Jay Barbree. NASA recorded a hit on reinforced carbon panels 7 and 8 on the left wing. The panels keep heat from re-entry from burning the spacecraft. ... This is the same area where foam damaged Columbia's left...

his is the official live thread for the Space Shuttle Atlantis.. The shuttle is suppose to launch at 7:38 PM EST. Mission updates can be found at Space Shuttle Atlantis Launch UpdatesIf you can't view the launch on Cable or Satellite you can go to the Nasa site to view launch live. AD ASTRA!!

A sudden, explosive thunderstorm Monday battered the shuttle Atlantis' external fuel tank with wind-driven, golf ball-sized hail, causing extensive damage to the tank's protective foam insulation. NASA managers said today engineers will have to move the shuttle back to the Vehicle Assembly Building for repairs, delaying launch on a space station assembly mission from March 15 to late April. With wind gusts as high as 62 mph at launch complex 39A Monday, early estimates indicated some 7,000 visible hail dings or blemishes in the orange insulation, mostly around the top of the external tank. John Chapman, external tank program manager...