Monday, May 16, 2011
Bruce Weaver / AFP/Getty Images
A gopher tortoise walks near the launchpad with the shuttle Endeavour at the Kennedy Space Center. The shuttle is due to begin its final mission today.
(05-16) 04:00 PDT Cape Canaveral --
With wounded Rep. Gabrielle Giffords on hand to watch, the space shuttle Endeavour is poised to give the workweek a roaring and historic start this morning, overcoming wiring problems that grounded it last month.
Giffords' arrival Sunday included a quick flyby of Endeavour on the launchpad, ready to go. The shuttle will be commanded by her husband, Mark Kelly.
"Gabrielle is excited for tomorrow's launch. Do you plan to see history in the making?" her staff tweeted.
NASA officials said conditions - from weather to technical issues - couldn't look much better for the scheduled 5:56 a.m. PDT launch.
Giffords, traveling on a NASA jet with the family of shuttle pilot Gregory Johnson, arrived shortly after the protective structure that surrounds Endeavour was moved out of the way - a milestone in launch preparations that allows fueling to begin.
Last month's launch attempt was scrubbed because of an electrical problem. NASA is expecting smaller crowds today - 400,000 people instead of 750,000 - for the second attempt.
The story of Giffords' recovery from the Jan. 8 mass shooting in her home district of Tucson, has drawn as much attention as the shuttle mission. She was shot in the head in an attack that killed six people.
Doctors cleared her to travel to see the launch. She came for the April attempt, flew back to Houston to resume her rehabilitation work and even had dinner out with her husband.
The main goal of Endeavour's 16-day mission is to haul a $2 billion astronomy and physics experiment to the International Space Station.
This is also the next-to-last flight for the 30-year-old space shuttle fleet. And it is the final flight of the shuttle Endeavour, which has flown 116.4 million miles in 24 previous flights.
Source: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/05/15/MN5O1JGGIU.DTL#ixzz1MV3K6zqh
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