Endeavour Shuttle & Crew Ready For Wednesday Launch
EL PASO, TX. – The shuttle crew of Endeavour STS-118 is preparing for Wednesday evening’s launch after engineers give the okay for launch following a cabinvalve repair.
Endeavour’s launch was originally slated for Tuesday, but engineers delayed this in order to repair a leaking cabin valve where the crew sits. Wednesday morning, NASA had nearly finished pumping 500,000 gallons of supercooled liquid hydrogen and oxygen into the shuttle’s main fuel tank. Weather reports are favorable for the evening launch at6:36 p.m.EST (4:30p.m. MST in in El Paso)that will send the 7-person crew to the international space station for nearly two weeks.
Among the crew is Barbara Morgan, the teacher-turned-astronaut who says this trip is over 20 years in the making. Morgan served as a backup ‘guest’ to teacher Christa McAuliffe who rode the space shuttle Challenger in 1986. Among thewitnesses on hand for Endeavour’s launch are the widow of Challenger’s commander, June Scobee Rodgers who commented on Morgan’s spaceflight.
“The Challenger crew, my husband Dick Scobee, Christa McAuliffe, they would be so happy with Barbara Morgan. They’d be excited for her, they’d proud of her and her following through with the mission for the teacher to fly in space.” Rodgers is the founding chairman of the Challenger Center for Space Science Education who added that Morgan serves as a role model for her students because of her patience and perserverance in following her dream.
Morgan will be seated in the same spot Christa McAuliffe rode during her trip on the Challenger. “I think the great thing about it is that people will be thinking aboutChallenger and thinking about theall the hard work lots of folks over many years have done to continue their mission,” Morgan commented in July.
The crew of seven is scheduled to meet with the international space station to continue construction, working to attach a new truss segment, replace a faulty gyroscope that allows the station to orient itself and deliver 5,000lbs. of cargo.The mission may be extended from 11 to 14 days, though that decision won’t be made for several days. If so, a fourth space walk could be added to the mission to install protective paneling on the international space station.
Beyond the Morgan, the remaining six crew members are made up of U.S. Navy Commander Scott Kelly, whose twin brother Mark was also a shuttle pilot, on shuttle Discovery in 2006; two fellow members of Kelly’s 1996 astronaut class, engineer Rick Mastracchio and U.S. Marine Lt. Col. Charles Hobaugh; Dr. Dafydd “Dave” Williams of the Canadian Space Agencythe crew’s medical officer; Dr. Tracy Caldwell, a chemist fluent in Russian and American Sign Language; and U.S. Air Force Col. Benjamin “Alvin” Drew, Jr. who will assist with photographic logs of the mission as well as transferance of cargo between shuttle and station.
Shuttle Endeavour launches without incident, both solid-rocket boosters and external fuel tank jettisoned without incident. Endeavour approaches its preliminary orbit. Barbara Morgan becomes the first teacher in space.
