Mission Delayed Seven Months By Glitch

Space Shuttle Atlantis will lunch May 12 on the STS-125 Mission to repair the Hubble Space Telescope, NASA announced.

The final servicing mission to Hubble was delayed in September when a data handling unit on the telescope failed, and a replacement unit had to be provided.

Since then, engineers have been working to prepare a spare for flight. They expect to be able to ship the spare, known as the Science Instrument Command and Data Handling System, to Kennedy Space Center in the spring.

This will be an 11-day flight featuring five spacewalks to extend Hubble’s life into the next decade by refurbishing and upgrading the telescope with state-of-the-art science instruments and swapping failed hardware. Scott Altman will command STS-125, with Gregory C. Johnson serving as pilot.

Mission specialists are veteran spacewalkers John Grunsfeld and Mike Massimino, and first-time space fliers Andrew Feustel, Michael Good and Megan McArthur.

Reflecting the announcement, the manifest has been adjusted to reflect current planning.

The next space shuttle mission, STS-119, is targeted for launch Feb. 12. Preparations continue for the STS-127 mission, currently targeted for launch in May. That launch will be further assessed and coordinated with NASA’s international partners at a later date.

STS-128 is targeted for August, and STS-129 is targeted for November.

All target launch dates are subject to change.

(For a complete detailed listing, please see the latest NASA launch schedule in this issue.)