Weather May Delay Atlantis' Landing

For Thursday forecasters predict storm, rain, cloud cover at 900m which is too low for landing. Cover at 1 500m is the minimum for the space craft landing, so Atlantis is now waiting for weather news.

"The primary flight rule concerns for (Kennedy Space Centre) on Thursday will be the possibility of thunderstorms within a 30 nautical mile radius... and a low cloud ceiling," said Kennedy Space Centre spokesperson George Diller.

Shuttle landing is scheduled to be in Florida and this is good news, because the weather is changing frequently there. But if weather doesn't change, Atlantis has one more alternative choice for landing, it's White Sands, New Mexico.

For Thursday Atlantis has two windows to enter atmosphere: at 16:50 GMT, for 17:55 GMT landing and at 18:25 GMT, for 19:30 GMT landing. For Thursday Atlantis has four windows to enter atmosphere: at 18:16 GMT and 19:51 GMT, for landing at Kennedy Space Centre, and at 21:21 GMT and 22:56 GMT, for landing at Edwards Air Force Base in California.

The space shuttle need to be back to the Earth, because its hydrogen-powered batteries will be spent soon.

Atlantis' mission passed successfully, the main aims are done perfectly, and the crew will be back home proudly.

During the mission astronauts installed solar arrays at the International Space Station, they repaired torn shuttle's heat shield, made four spacewalks, repaired the Russian computer that was for 48 hours. They took US astronaut Sunita Williams from International Space Station, who was there since December 10th. Instead of her Clayton Anderson and two Russian cosmonauts will stay at International Space Station.

By 2010 International Space Station is scheduled to be fully installed, and Atlantis will have 12 more missions to complete the installation, then the space shuttle will retire. For HULIQ.com