Launch of shuttle Discovery delayed again to late Friday

BEIJING, Aug. 28 — NASA postponed again the launch try of the space shuttle Discovery from early Friday morning to late Friday night, according to media reports Friday.

NASA said the liftoff time will be 11:59 p.m. EDT (0359 Aug. 29 GMT).

NASA made this decision on Thursday to give engineers additional time to make sure that a hydrogen fuel valve in the shuttle’s engine compartment will function normally during fueling.

The critical valve appeared to malfunction Tuesday midway through the fueling process for the Wednesday morning launch. The valve was tested Wednesday night, and all the normal results indicated that it was a problem with a sensor rather than the valve itself.

It will be the third try for NASA to launch Discovery. The previous two delays were caused by the stormy weather early Tuesday and the valve glitch later that day.

Discovery is bound for the International Space Station (ISS) with seven crew members on board and more than 7.5 tons of supplies and equipment.

If it cannot lift off by the end of August, Discovery would not possibly launch until Oct. 17 due to space traffic conflicts at the ISS.

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