Space Shuttle Endeavour Launch Delayed Again

NASA officials announced at 9:15 this morning that the Space Shuttle Endeavour will not launch on Monday and will not announce until Monday when the next possible launch attempt will be.


NASA has determined that it must remove the Load Control Assembly (LCA), a switchbox, to continue to troubleshoot the problem as that appears to be where the problem lies. By removing the LCA, and once the problem has been fixed, engineers will need time to conduct tests to assure that the box is working correctly after it’s been put back.
This most likely means at least a weeks delay in the launch. With an Atlas 5 scheduled for launch on May 6th from the Cape Canaveral side, the next earliest launch window would be May 8th. However NASA officials have said that they prefer the May 9th or 10th window. If a launch was to happen on May 9th it would be at 11:46:43 am EDT.
More details will be available later this afternoon when NASA managers will brief the media. You can watch the briefing on NASA TV. At this time no firm time has been set for the briefing but a NASA official said it could be 3:00 or 4:00 pm EDT.
Endeavour’s crew has already left the Kennedy Space Center for Houston where they will wait out the delay and continue preparations for the next launch attempt.
You can follow updates as they happen on our Twitter account @CanadaInSpace.

About Marc Boucher

Boucher is an entrepreneur, writer, editor & publisher. He is the founder of SpaceQ Media Inc. and CEO and co-founder of SpaceRef Interactive LLC. Boucher has 20+ years working in various roles in the space industry and a total of 30 years as a technology entrepreneur including creating Maple Square, Canada's first internet directory and search engine.

Leave a Reply