Wind, rain and low clouds delay Atlas launch 24 hours

An Atlas 5 sits through stormy weather on Friday. (ULA)

Low clouds, high winds and rain scrubbed today's planned launch of an Atlas rocket which is to carry an unmanned military mini space shuttle.

The launch team is now in a 24-hour launch turn around as they try again on Saturday at 4:09 p.m. EST.

The weather forecast is not as promising for Saturday with only a 30% chance of favorable weather at launch time.

As the final minutes of a two hour launch window neared, the launch team took one final poll and the range stated they were no-go due to the weather over Cape Canaveral.

Inda's GSLV rocket launch scrubbed due to leak

India today has scrubbed Monday's launch attempt of their GSLV-F06 rocket with the GSAT-5P satellite bound for geostationary orbit.

The launch countdown was due to pickup at the T-29 hour point, however "a minor leak in one of the valves of the Russian Cryogenic stage" was discovered during checks of the vehicle prior to picking up the count, the country's Satish Dhawan Space Center stated.

The cryo stage in question is the third stage which uses a mixture of super cold liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen to burn the stage's KVD engine.

The 161-foot white rocket uses four strap-on liquid rocket boosters and a solid fueled core engine at launch. The core engine's burn time is about 100 seconds.

A new date will be announced in the coming days, the space center adds, once the reason for the leak is discovered.

A GSLV launch last April resulted in it's satellite reaching a lower than planned orbit and being lost.

Delta II Launch to Try Again Tonight

A Delta rocket in California suffered a last minute scrub on Monday evening and technicians hope to have the vehicle ready for another try tonight.

As the countdown neared two minutes, a cutoff was ordered when engineers saw "an insufficient flow of gaseous nitrogen (GN2) in the Delta II engine compartment," United Launch Alliance stated moments after the scrub.

The GN2 flow is used to keep areas near the super cold fuel lines warm at launch.

Do to this flight's one-second launch window, the scrub occurred immediately and the launch team went into a 24-hour turn around.

The ULA Delta II 7420-10 with the COSMO-Skymed 4 satellite is set for a third launch attempt tonight at 10:20 pm EDT (7:20 pm Pacific) from complex 2 at Vandenberg, AFB in California.

This evening's launch will mark the 350th Delta flight; and just the third Delta II launch of the year.

The 126-foot tall white rocket will lift-off with a Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne RS-27A core engine and four strap on solid boosters to provide the initial thrust for it's climb to orbit. The combined thrust at launch is just over 700,000 pounds.

The launch path will carry the vehicle almost due south out over the Pacific Ocean to align it for an intended Polar orbit.

Spacecraft separation over Africa's east coast should occur at 11:18 pm EDT.

"COSMO-SkyMed is a constellation composed of four satellites equipped with Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) operating at X-band," the satellite's Italian operator states. The COSMO-Skymed 4 will operate for Mediterranean basin observation.

Tonight's launch will place the fourth environmental monitoring and surveillance spacecraft in a specialized orbit for use by both military and civilian use.

The new earth imaging satellite's six year mission "is financed by the Ministry for Education, Universities and Scientific Research, the Italian Space Agency (ASI) and the Ministry of Defense", according to Telespazio which is the control center for the satellite constellation.

Meanwhile, on the south side of Vandenberg, a brush fire has been burning since Thursday on the dry fields of the military base. Over 500 acres have been burned since a suspect power line caused the fire days ago in the Bear Creek region.

Although this fire will not effect the Delta's flight, Vandenberg officials told me that "the area involved is known to contain unexploded ordnance".

Japanese Rocket Launch Scrubbed Due to Rain

A Japanese rocket set to carry a planetary observation satellite into space and toward Venus was scrubbed today due to inclement weather at the Tanegashima Space Center.

The Japanese Space Agency scrubbed the launch at T-5 minutes, due to rainy weather, high winds and low clouds over and around launch pad 1. The launch team will try again on Tuesday afternoon.

The H-2A rocket was to have lifted-off at 5:44 pm EDT.

High Winds Scrub Atlas V Launch Today

High winds forced NASA to scrub the launch of an Atlas rocket this morning from Cape Canaveral, Florida.

Launch has been retargeted for Thursday morning with a new launch time of 10:23 am EST. The launch window is one hour.

Wind speeds in excess of the 20 mph rule caused the Atlas launch team to delay the launch time three times before calling a scrub for the day one second after the count picked up at T-4 minutes.

Low clouds may be a concern tomorrow along America's Space Coast, thus the Air Force Meteorology group is forecasting 60% go for favorable weather.

SpaceLaunchNews.com will have LIVE TV of the prelaunch through spacecraft separation beginning at 8AM EST tomorrow.

Discovery Launch Scrubed due to stuck Valve

Discovery sits at Pad 39-A this evening following the scrub.

Launch control at the Kennedy Space Center stopped fueling the space shuttle's fuel tank late today and canceled tonight's launch attempt of Discovery due to a fuel valve which would not close.

"A problem cropped up with a fill-and-drain valve in the bottom part of the shuttle, the aft part of the shuttle, related to the liquid hydrogen," NASA launch commentator Allard Beutel stated as the scrub was official.

As of tonight, launch would occur no earlier than this Friday morning at 12:22:07 am EDT.

SCRUB: Rain Clouds Delay Discovery Launch

Strong rains, lightning and low clouds formed along the Space Coast forcing NASA to scrub this morning's launch attempt of the space shuttle Discovery and retargeting launch for early Wednesday morning.

The launch team is resetting the clock to target launch of Discovery on her 37th mission for tomorrow at 1:10:22 am EDT.

Cape weather is predicting a 70% chance for favorable weather at launch time.

We will have continuing LIVE NASA-TV in widescreen via SpaceLaunchNews.com, and updates via our Twitter feed all day today through launch.

NASA has until August 31st to launch Discovery, or stand down until mid-October due to several factors. On September 10th, a Japanese cargo ship launches to the space station; and on September 30th, the 21st station expedition crew launches and will dock with the space station two days later.