Orbital ATK Delays Launch Of Resupply Mission To Space Station

NASA will make its fourth launch attempt this afternoon.

There’s a 40 percent chance of weather good enough to permit a liftoff from Launch Complex 41 during a 30-minute window that closes just before sunset. The issue that caused the flight’s delay was the same as yesterdays – very high winds that were forecasted for later today.

According to the Spaceflight Now website, it had been scheduled to lift off Saturday at 5:10 p.m. NY time from Cape Canaveral, Florida, and then was reset for 5:33 p.m. before the launch was suspended.

NASA officials have chose to delay the launch of the Orbital ATK-made Cygnus spacecraft because of bad weather.

NASA is anxious to get its commercial supply chain moving again. Its next cargo ship, launched two months later, ended up in the Atlantic following a failure of its Falcon rocket.

Orbital will be making use of Atlas V rockets from a joint venture of Boeing Co. and Lockheed Martin Corp. for two missions while it revamps its Antares rocket, which exploded above a Virginia launch pad past year. But even the Atlas is no match for Mother Nature.

Mark Kelly is a retired astronaut as well as an author; his “Mousetronaut” and “Mousetronaut Goes to Mars” are among seven storybooks inside the Cygnus.

“I don’t know what I anticipate more, #Mousetronaut or the new #StarWars movie”, Scott shot back via Twitter. This is its first station mission. On board since March, he’ll be up there until the beginning of this coming March. But the wind still was dangerously high; the launch team was hoping the gusts would ease in time for a 4:44 p.m. send-off.

Launch Notes: OA-4 will mark the 60th launch of the Atlas V and the 30th launch in the 401 configuration.