Stuck in a moment

It’s been all quiet on the space front today as NASA engineers work to remove and replace the faulty electrical distribution box before starting an exhaustive round of tests over at least 48 hours.

I had lunch at a Cuban restaurant called Roberto’s - a few miles south of Cocoa Beach - with Steve Young, who also had a stint working on Spaceflight magazine in the 1990s.

He bought Astronomy Now magazine on leaving Spaceflight and also launched the spaceflightnow.com website.

Space Shuttle missions have been his great passion and Steve’s own ‘mission control’ is an office building (pictured below) at KSC, over-looking the countdown clock and launch pads.

Like for many Shuttle workers, things will probably have to change for the spaceflightnow.com team after the final Shuttle mission is concluded this summer.

Which brings me to when the launch of Endeavour on the penultimate Space Shuttle flight might actually taken place.

A launch this coming Sunday, which also happens to be Mother’s Day in America, has already been ruled out as the repair work pushes the crew's next launch attempt to at least Tuesday, 10 May. An official launch date will probably not be announced until Friday, after repairs have been given the all-clear.

If liftoff doesn't occur next week things become decidedly more complex to organise at the Space Station - and there is even talk of the flight slipping right through to the end of June, the next most favourable launch window.

During last Friday’s countdown, the electrical fault could have easily gone either way. But it took the wrong path - and, to borrow the title from the U2 album ‘All that you can’t leave behind’, Endeavour became ‘Stuck in a moment you can’t get out of’.

Setting sail

NASA finally confirmed mid-afternoon what everyone had been expecting - that the launch of Endeavour would be put back to at least next Sunday and perhaps May 10 so a faulty electronic switch box that routes power to critical systems can be replaced.

The hopes of a new launch attempt early in the week evaporated after it became clear that the switch box would have to be replaced, and the work and extensive testing could not be been completed in time to launch prior to a planned Atlas rocket flight on Friday.

Mike Moses, chairman of the launch management team, stressed that 8 May was only a working target at this stage, hinting that if the box changeover and testing was not straightforward the delay could be longer.

He said they hoped to announce a new target launch date by the middle of the week.

An initial launch attempt was scrapped on Friday after heaters on one of the Shuttle's Auxiliary Power Units failed. The problem was traced to the switch box, which will be replaced early this week. The testing of a spare switch box is expected to take an additional two days.

Meanwhile, at nearby Port Canaveral on Sunday afternoon, a procession of three giant cruise ships embarked on their own voyages of discovery.

This picture shows the Freedom of the Seas with 5000 passengers and 1000 crew making its way out into the Atlantic.

Two ships that shouldn’t have been in dock today - or at least on their way back in to port - were NASA’s booster recovery vessels, Liberty Star and Freedom Star.

Had Endeavour launched as originally planned on Friday, the two ships would normally have been arriving back during the day with the recovered solid rocket boosters in tow.

Safety first

Okay, well the news is not good from KSC this morning. The media briefing is off until 2 pm this afternoon but the launch of Endeavour is definitely off for a few days at the very least.

Rather than just change a thermostat it looks as though they need to change the whole electrical box of tricks - which has to be followed by 48 hours of testing.

There is a chance the launch could switch to Thursday or Friday if the negotiations depending on how the Atlas launch is progressing and whether that could be changed. Otherwise it is most likely to go until early next week. A new launch date will be set tomorrow.

All gutted here - but that’s the way of these things. Safety of the Shuttle and its crew is paramount, and with only two Space Shuttle launches left no one wants to take any chances.

Status briefing

Rumours and stories are flying about early this Sunday morning by text, email and twitter about whether Endeavour could launch this week.

The problem is they only have until Wednesday before the launch attempt has to stand down so that an Atlas rocket can be prepared for launch on Friday.

Rules dictate that only one launch vehicle can be fuelled and in the final stages of preparation at any one time. The next launch window for Endeavour opens on 8 May.

NASA management meetings to work out a plan are taking place as I write this and should be finalised soon. Then there will be a news briefing at the press centre at 1030 am (which should be aired live on NASA TV at 3.30 pm BST).

At the moment it seems the weather forecast is ‘red’ for Monday as well, with strong crosswinds and rain showers. It gets better if there is to be an attempt on Tuesday.

The electrical problem is likely either an open circuit in a hydraulic system fuel line heater thermostat or trouble inside an avionics box in the Shuttle's aft engine compartment.

Initial thermostat tests were consistent with a problem in the avionics box but engineers have not ruled out a connector problem or some other wiring issue elsewhere in the system.

If the problem can be isolated to an open circuit in a suspect thermostat, it is possible to install a replacement in time to support a second launch attempt this week.

Standby! 

Time for a break

With the KSC media centre closed on Saturday it was a chance to take a break from the space routine and recharge the batteries with an afternoon walk along Cocoa Beach to the resort's small pier.

 

Among the more interesting sights was a beach wedding and the departure of a cruise ship from nearby Port Canaveral.

 

Meanwhile, back at the launch site, Endeavour's countdown was being held at the T-minus 11 hour mark.

News came out late on Saturday afternoon that an APU thermostat had failed tests. If so, this is the better of the two most likely failures and would allow work to proceed towards a new launch attempt on Monday.

Technicians continued working late into the night to test thermostats for Endeavour's APU-1 fuel line heater to help determine what caused it to fail.

NASA flight planners also tweaked Endeavour's target liftoff time for a Monday launch attempt to 2:34 pm (7.34 pm GMT).

If a Monday launch is possible, the countdown would resume at 10:07 pm on Sunday, with fuelling starting at 5:09 am and the crew strapping in at 11:14 am on Monday.

Meet and greet

A few hundred metres - I guess it’s about as close as I’ll ever get to the President of America.

With the launch postponement still fresh, the visit of President Barack Obama and his family to Kennedy Space Center on Friday afternoon gave the assembled media something else to focus on.

I joined some of the TV crews and presenters on the roof of the CBS tower which is a good two storeys high and provided a grandstand view of the space centre landscape.

Obama was arriving on site by Marine helicopter after landing at the nearby Cape Canaveral Air Force Station - and the media cameras were scouring the horizon, all wanting to be first to pick up the imminent arrival.

America doesn’t do things by halves and in the end there were five military helicopters buzzing over KSC as the President swooped in, taking in a view of Endeavour on the pad on the way over.

From our distance it wasn’t easy to identify exactly which helicopter he was in - but then it turned out we’d been dupped anyway.

As we all focussed on the four big helicopters manoeuvring in from the north east behind the giant Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB), Obama’s chopper had discretely moved in at lower level from a westerly direction.

The first family was already on the ground as the four military escort helicopters put on a mini display for the live TV cameras, making it look as though they were landing the President.

So there was President Obama, wife Michelle and their two girls already being shown around the Atlantis Space Shuttle in the Orbiter Processing Facility, in reality not so far from where we were standing.

It would have been the first time in NASA history that a sitting President and his family had witnessed a Shuttle launch.

As well as seeing Atlantis in the VAB, The President and his wife met briefly with Endeavour's crew. Obama told them he was still hoping to get back to Florida for a liftoff.

So, unhappily but not unexpectedly, I didn’t get remotely close enough for a Presidential meet and greet or that all important handshake. The official party remained mostly inside while we media were cocooned on our tower, watching from afar in the afternoon sunshine. 　

Last minute hitch

 "We will not fly this machine until it is ready - and today it was not ready." These were the words of flight director Mike Leinbach at the end of a press briefing this afternoon following the postponement of the launch of Endeavour.

At the Kennedy Space Center it was a day of highs and lows. Despite the early overcast skies there was optimism and excitement in the air.

Ironically, by the end of the day, it was the weather that was cooperating and the technology that had gone arry. An hour before the scheduled launch time clear blue skies had returned making perfect conditions for liftoff.

The Shuttle team had worked hard through the previous night, performing the Rotating Service Structure retraction at the launch pad shortly before midnight to leave Endeavour bathed in bright arch lights, looking pristine and ready to go.

The milestone in preparing the Shuttle for launch came some five hours later than planned but the team still managed to start fuelling on time first thing in the morning.

From an outside perspective it seemed as though things were all going to plan - but behind closed doors the team had been alerted at around 9 am to a potential problem with a heater associated with the Shuttle's hydraulic power system.

Blissfully unaware of the unfolding situation, things continued as normal and I was among about 150 of the reporters and photographers present signed up to witness the crew walkout at the start of their journey to the launch pad.

Before being allowed on the NASA buses to transport us to the viewing point all bags and equipment had to be placed in a line for inspection by an army sniffer dog. This is standard practice when being taken to any secure KSC area.

A drive of several miles brought us to the Operations and Checkout building where the astronaut crew had been quarantined in their quarters since arriving two days previously.

We had a wait of about 45 minutes, a security helicopter with a machine gunner positioned in the open door swooping overhead. When it began to hover above at about midday we knew the crew, dressed in their orange flight suits, were about to appear.

After posing for photos they were off in the silver Astrovan with military escort to the launch pad. The iconic Astrovan has been used to transport crews to launch pads at KSC since the days of the Apollo Moon programme.

We’re back on the buses in a few minutes and head along the same route back towards the press centre area. But, bizarrely, after a mile or so, we see blue flashing lights coming in the opposite direction - closely followed by a speeding Astrovan.

It could mean only one thing - the launch had been aborted and the crew were on their way back to their quarters. In the next few seconds word came through via Twitter and text message confirming a postponement.

The Shuttle has three Auxiliary Power Units (APUs) that provide hydraulic power to steer the vehicle during ascent and entry. NASA’s launch commit criteria and flight rules require all three APUs to be fully operational for launch.

Endeavour's orange external fuel tank had to be drained of more than 500,000 gallons of liquid hydrogen and oxygen - a process taking about 24 hours - before engineers could access the area and evaluate the issue with APU 1. The only option was to postpone the launch for at least 72 hours.