NASA cautious about a possible nighttime Shuttle launch

NASA cautious about a possible nighttime Shuttle launch

US space agency NASA has said that they would prefer to conduct one more Space Shuttle launch during the daytime before they can go ahead with a night lift-off.

NASA administrator Mike Griffin added that launches at nighttime would only resume once the engineers are satisfied with safety changes made to the orbiter system.

These rules were set after the NASA suffered a catastrophe with the Columbia Space Shuttle disaster, which ended with all the astronauts onboard dying during the collapse of the craft.

The daytime launches enable the photographers to closely record a shuttle’s climb to space in minute detail. This gives NASA enough data to conduct repairs on the surface of the shuttle before it is commissioned to return back to earth.

Dr Griffin said: “The launch of Discovery was one element to resuming night launches. Our plan is to have one more daylight launch before resuming night operations. We do need to resume night operations to complete the space station – we’ve always known that.”