The US space agency NASA says it is considering a June 17 launch for the shuttle Endeavour after its mission to the International Space Station was postponed over a hydrogen leak.
Shuttle launch director Pete Nickolenko said Sunday the root cause of the leak in Endeavour's external fuel tank had not yet been determined but that the team was "confident" that repair procedures for a similar leak on space shuttle Discovery in March would work for the current mission.
Technicians at NASA's Kennedy Space Center were expected to complete the repairs by 6:00 am (1000 GMT) Monday.
The leak in one of Endeavour's venting systems was detected early Saturday just hours before the shuttle's planned launch. The system is used to carry excess hydrogen safely away from the launch pad.
Nickolenko said that technicians had emptied Endeavour's external tank, which contains some two million liters of liquid hydrogen and oxygen, in order to provide a safe environment for the technicians.
Endeavour's new target blast-off date of Wednesday may present a conflict as NASA has scheduled a liftoff on the same day for the Lunar crater observation and sensing satellite (LRO/LCROSS).
Space shuttle deputy program manager LeRoy Cain told reporters a decision is to be made on Monday about which mission would be prioritized.
He stressed that in order for the shuttle to launch on Wednesday, "everything has to continue to go well, we need to have no breakage on the shuttle processing side … we need to have not too much bad weather that keeps us from doing work on the pad and we need to have no other issues."
Endeavour, Cain said, was "in great shape and not experiencing any other issues." His comments followed a two-hour meeting by shuttle managers to evaluate repairs on the shuttle and discuss the next launch attempt.
Should the moon probe launch first on the 17th, the shuttle would only have one more launch opportunity this month, on Saturday the 20th.
If the shuttle blasts off on Wednesday, the moon probe would have two more launch opportunities on Friday or Saturday, and possibly another on Thursday.
If Endeavour cannot launch in June, the next available blast-off date would be July 11 at the earliest, which "we could certainly tolerate," Cain said.
When Endeavour finally lifts off, it will be the 32nd mission to the ISS, which orbits 350 kilometers (220 miles) above Earth, and the last of three missions to assemble the Japanese Kibo laboratory aboard the orbiting space station.
Construction on the station began a decade ago, and the push is on to complete it before NASA ends its shuttle missions in September 2010.
The crew of six US astronauts and a Canadian female astronaut that Endeavour is expected to eventually bring to the ISS will join another US astronaut and one more from Canada, as well as two Russians, a Belgian and Japan's Koichi Wakata who are currently living on the ISS.
Mission specialist Tim Kopra is set to replace Wakata, who will return to Earth after a three-month stint at the orbiting outpost.
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