NASA Clears Discovery for Sat July 1st Launch-now July 4th

Well lets just all keep our fingers crossed - no point getting worried about it before it happens.

Assuming Discovery does launch on schedule later today, how good are the chances of us being able to see it? It's unfortunate that the series of ISS passes over Ireland is coming to an end, with just one more between 22:52 and 22:54 tomorrow night, according to Heaven's Above. It's also a pretty low pass, only getting to 12 degrees altitude from Dublin.

What I'm not sure about is how long the shuttle will take to find and dock with the ISS. Will it already have done this by that time? If not, how far behind the ISS will it be (in terms of time)? And will it even be bright enough to be seen at all bearing in mind that the ISS will be at mag +1.7. I've never seen the shuttle before so I have no idea what to expect in terms of brightness.

Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

Dwane.

Going for launch later today, July 4th - from cnn.com:

The seven-member crew of the space shuttle Discovery, waving American flags, arrived at the launch pad for a scheduled launch at 2:38 p.m. ET -- the first time a shuttle has attempted to lift off on the Fourth of July.

NASA decided to go ahead with the launch after finding a pencil-sized crack in the foam insulation around the shuttle's fuel tank on Monday.

"It all looks fine, and the structure is in good shape," Associate Administrator William Gerstenmaier told reporters.

The astronauts were all smiles as they suited up Tuesday morning.

Cmdr. Steve Lindsey appeared relaxed, shaking a crew assistant's hand before entering the cockpit where he was strapped into his seat for the ride into space.

"They were feeling great, they feel ready to go and are encouraged about the weather forecast this morning," said astronaut Scott Kelly, whose brother Mark Kelly is the pilot of the shuttle.

So far, there's an 80 percent chance that the weather won't interfere with the launch. CNN Meteorologist Chad Myers reported some showers developing off the coast of Florida later in the day.

Earlier Tuesday, in the course of the latest inspections, a circuit breaker in the shuttle's backup heating system wasn't working, NASA officials said, but it was a problem that could be fixed quickly.

Plans call for a 12-day mission to deliver supplies to the space station and drop off European Space Agency astronaut Thomas Reiter, who will join the Expedition 13 crew members already there.

Two astronauts, Piers Sellers and Mike Fossum, will conduct two spacewalks to test a new shuttle robotic arm and to repair a damaged piece of equipment outside the space station.

They might also do a third spacewalk to test repair techniques on the shuttle's thermal protection system.
Narrow crack

The launch, already scrubbed twice due to bad weather, was threatened a third time Monday after an inspection found a 4- to 5-inch crack in the external fuel tank's foam insulation.

The cracked insulation covered a bracket that connects the liquid oxygen feed line to shuttle Discovery's external fuel tank.

Engineers believe the problem stemmed from a buildup of frozen condensation that crushed a small piece of foam, Deputy Program Manager John Shannon told reporters earlier Monday.

When engineers went to inspect it, they found a .0057-pound, 3-inch piece of foam had "pinched off."

Even so, Shannon said, had that piece fallen off during launch, it wouldn't have damaged the orbiter.

"It turns out there is more foam on this strut than is really needed for its intended purposes," Gerstenmaier said.


Fingers and toes crossed,

Seanie.