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Space Shuttle Endeavour Launch Set for Wednesday, June 17

by Rob Walker | June 15, 2009 at 05:58 am

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The space shuttle Endeavour is set to launch on Wednesday, June 17 at 5:40am EDT. Friday's launch was aborted after a safety check uncovered a hydrogen venting leak. NASA is anticipating no further delays once the leak repair has been confirmed.

The only problem is that another NASA mission, two science crafts set to launch for the moon, had been planned for the same day.

This pushes the launch of the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS), a robotic probe to be launched aboard an unmanned Atlas V rocket, to June 18. The launch site at Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral, Florida, will have to be reconfigured to accommodate the different types of spacecraft.

Endeavour's planned June 13 liftoff was postponed because of a leak associated with the gaseous hydrogen venting system outside the shuttle's external fuel tank.

"If shuttle goes first on the 17th, then the most opportunities we can give LRO is two, and that would be on the 19th and 20th," Cain said. "If LRO goes first on the 17th, then the most opportunities we could get for the shuttle is one opportunity, and that would be on the 20th."

However, Mission Management Team Chairman LeRoy Cain told reporters the team's preference was for a Wednesday launch, although the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) is also set to launch from the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida on the same day.

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