Atlantis launch blog

LIFTOFF, 2:45 P.M.

NASA beat the odds Thursday and sent space shuttle Atlantis soaring into surprisingly clear skies.

After months of waiting, it was all over in the blink of an eye.  Less than 10 minutes after launch, Atlantis was in orbit, en route to a weekend rendezvous with the space station.

Check out the frame-by-frame photo gallery of the launch here: http://media.myfoxtampabay.com/galleries/STS-122-launc
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And you can also see what was happening at the Cape all morning with the countdown gallery here: http://media.myfoxtampabay.com/galleries/STS-122/

Despite the awful forecast, Atlantis finally made it off the pad this afternoon.  The clouds and showers held off, allowing the shuttle to climb through mostly blue skies on its way to orbit.  A loud cheer went up as it launched, which was quickly drowned out by the shirt-flapping roar of the booster engines.

Everything is looking good so far; pictures are uploading so check back in a few minutes.

There's a lot of optimism out here as we get within a half-hour of launch time.  The largest bunch of showers, over near Orlando, is moving northeast and is not expected to be a factor.  Winds remain the primary concern, but are within acceptable limits for the moment.

There are scattered clouds, but they seem to be high enough that they are only slightly a concern.

MONITORING THE FEEDS FROM THE SATELLITE TRUCK

At the press center, the large contingent of European reporters and photographers are getting into place for a prime viewing spot.  Many of them have been waiting months, if not longer, to see the European Space Agency's Columbus module carried into orbit.

If things continue as they have, today may be the day.  Stay with us for updates either way.

It's still really breezy out here, and NASA has strict rules about crosswinds.  They are not only for the safety of the shuttle as it climbs into orbit, but also in case of an abort that would require Atlantis to return to the launch site and land here.  Of course, that's never been done before, but rules are rules.

As you get higher in the atmosphere, the winds pick up.  The question is, how close to the ground will those gusts reach by launch time?  The American flag and Atlantis flag out by the historic blue countdown clock are whipping well. 

Right now, we are still in the 'green.'  But otherwise, things are proceeding smoothly with the countdown.

We have just over one hour to go...

Quick update -- chances for a weather delay have dropped from 70 percent to 60 percent.  Not much, but welcome news nonetheless.

Meanwhile, Mission Control has given a 'go' to close the hatch.

It looks like the entire crew is pretty much strapped in.  Mission Control is running through a series of comm checks to make sure everyone's equipment is good.

Meanwhile, there aren't many more clouds in the area than there were before, but the clouds that are here seem to be getting bigger.  There is a weather plane poking around up there, passing information down to Mission Control, while meteorologists on the ground are watching radar and satellite images.  It looks like the decision could go right up to launch time.

There are the usual members of the media and other dignitaries here, but we're also hearing from NASA that a dozen veterans from the James A. Haley VA Hospital in Tampa are here.  We're trying to track them down and get more info.

In addition to all of them, we caught this happy guy sunning himself earlier:



For more countdown photos, follow this link: http://media.myfoxtampabay.com/galleries/STS-122/

As always, we'll have another update soon.

The astronauts are being loaded into the shuttle now.  At the moment, we are "all green" on weather, but there is still concern about clouds moving very slowly this way from the west.  The hope, obviously, is that they'll stay away for the next three hours.

It's still breezy, and it's starting to warm up quite a bit out here.

Photos are uploading now....check back later for the first gallery.

It's a much nicer day over here at the Cape than it is in Tampa.  Some high-level clouds are allowing the sun to peek through more often than not.  And the low-level morning clouds are burning off.  But it's windy. 

Right now, the Air Force meteorologists are concerned about both clouds and rain at launch time, but our Howard Shapiro says it's mostly the clouds that will be an issue.  We will see.

The crew has begun suiting up and they'll head to the pad soon.

The first round of tests on Atlantis' repaired fuel sensors is complete and things are looking good -- at least as far as fueling is concerned.  The weather remains a concern.

Several sensor failures in the shuttle's orange external tank brought two December launch attempts to a screeching halt.  Since then, the componants in question were removed, repaired and improved, and re-installed.  So far, so good.

It still looks like the weather will prevent today's 2:45 p.m. launch attempt.   It all hinges on the progress of that killer front that swept through the country's midsection the last few days.

The FOX 13 crew at the Cape will continue to provide updates throughout the day.

NASA will be looking for a hole in the weather, so to speak, when they try to launch Atlantis tomorrow.  That nasty line of storms that killed dozens of people in the last few days is heading this way, and while it will be much weaker than it was in Arkansas and Tennessee, there's a chance that it will force a launch delay -- a 70% chance, according to Air Force meteorologists.

Atlantis was supposed to launch in early December on a mission to deliver part of a European lab to the space station.  But fuel sensor problems halted two attempts, and forced NASA to make time-consuming -- but hopefully worthwhile -- repairs.

We should not have to wait long to see if those repairs work.  Any similar failure will likey happen when the super-cold fuel hits the sensors, which is very early on in the fueling process.  That's scheduled to start around 5:20 a.m.

NASA managers will meet before then to check on the weather and give a go/no-go for fueling.  Lightning in the area at that time could mean a quick end to Thursday's attempt.

Should there be a weather delay, the forecast improves Friday and even more Saturday.

As always, Warren Elly and the FOX 13 crew is at the Cape.  Stay with us for updates.

Even rocket scientists deserve some time off.

That's NASA's stance, anyway.  They have opted to delay Atlantis' launch until January 10, 2008 in order to give their workers more time with their families for the holidays.

The launch has already been delayed twice because of a nagging fuel sensor problem.  Next week, engineers will conduct fueling tests to see if they can pin down exactly what the problem is.

The launch time for a January 10 attempt -- dictated by the orbit of the space station -- would be 2:26 a.m.  It'll be worth crawling out of bed for that one, even from all the way over here...

One of Atlantis' fuel sensors failed again during fueling early Sunday morning.  Ordinarily, that would not be a show-stopper, but under the new launch rules proposed by the astronaut office and adopted by NASA on Friday, the launch should attempt should be scrubbed.

It's not yet clear what that means for the rest of the launch attempts this week.  The launch window was supposed to close after Thursday, but yesterday NASA officials said they were investigating whether a Friday launch could still work.  They had previously said that if they miss this window, they would not try again until January.

OK, so NASA will try again on Saturday -- maybe -- to launch Atlantis.   Officials say they want to give the engineers another day to analyze the malfunctioning fuel sensors.

http://www.myfoxtampabay.com/myfox/pages/ContentDe
tail?contentId=5138958

Just some thoughts after the afternoon-turned-evening press conference...It's good to see the agency pausing to address concerns despite the scheduling crunch they are in.  The fact that the presser was delayed -- what, four or five times -- shows that there is healthy debate allowed to happen, which was the goal of the post-Challenger and post-Columbia reforms.

That being said, it sounded a bit like they are trying to talk themselves into ignoring the malfunctioning gauges.  At least now they have some time to reflect on that decision. 

The tentative plan for Friday is a 2 p.m. Mission Management Team meeeting, and press conference afterward, no earlier than 5 p.m.

Bad news for NASA: two fuel sensors inside the shuttle's external fuel tank failed to operate while about 40 minutes into the fueling process this morning, and officials have been forced to scrub today's launch attempt.  It's a problem NASA has experienced more than once since the return to flight after the Columbia disaster.

While the scrub is frustrating, going forward with the launch while the sensors aren't working properly could prove disastrous.  You see, there are a total of four sensors inside the external fuel tank, and they work to make sure that the main engines shut down at exactly the right moment when the shuttle goes into orbit.  If they turn off a bit too early or a bit to late, it could spell disaster for the shuttle and its crew. 

For that reason, NASA requires that at least three of the sensors are in working order for a shuttle to fly.  Obviously, that wasn't the case today. 

What makes this even worse is that of all things, the weather at the Cape today is absolutely perfect!  Now, we can only hope for the same (and three working fuel sensors) tomorrow. 

Friday's launch time is scheduled for 4:09 p.m.  Check back here for more as we get further details. 

By this evening, hopefully Atlantis and her crew will be in orbit, en route to deliver a big chunk of hardware to the space station.  In the meantime, here are some links to get up to speed on the mission and the future plans.

There's a nice interactive timeline from NASA that explains what the schedule is for the mission: http://www.nasa.gov/externalflash/STS122_flash/

You can find the NASA press kit, mission fact sheet, and more here: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/main/index
.html

The Orion program is well underway.  You can learn more about the shuttle's eventual replacement here: http://www.nasa.gov/topics/moonmars/index.html<
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And we'll have photo galleries from the Cape of course, but you can check out other photos from this mission on Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/groups/sts122/