Space Shuttle Atlantis Scheduled to Blast Toward International Space Station Friday
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: The shuttle Atlantis is scheduled to lift off before sunrise tomorrow, heading to the International Space Station. Our Miles O'Brien explains what the mission is all about.</s>MILES O'BRIEN, CNN SPACE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): By now, the $60 billion International Space Station should have looked like this. Instead, it remains like this -- a fledgling, and an ailing one at that. So the seven-member crew of the space shuttle Atlantis is making an urgent house call.</s>JIM HALSELL, ATLANTIS COMMANDER: The reason we're flying this flight on this date is to extend the life of the space station.</s>O'BRIEN: The station was supposed to be home and office to a three-person Russian and American crew by now. The reason for the deal: The Russian-built crew quarters, the so-called service module, has not been put into service due to a lack of cash and confidence in the proton rocket that will carry it into space. The Russians now say they have their act together and the service module will fly in mid- July. But meanwhile, the manufacturer's warranty on the station has expired.</s>SCOTT HOROWITZ, ATLANTIS PILOT: So our job is to go up and replace these serviceable items, fix a few items that have failed, and basically get the station in a posture where it's ready to receive the service module, which will lead onto what our mission originally was going to be.</s>O'BRIEN: This mission was supposed to fly after the service module docked at the station, so the crew had been trained in how to activate it for the first station keepers. When NASA managers re- jiggered the schedule and the mission in February, they took the three service module experts off the flight. There were replaced with a crew scheduled to live aboard the space station next year.</s>HALSELL: We literally lived together and trained together, spending, in some cases, more time with each other than we do with our own families for more than a year. So there were some close bonds there and it was, from a psychological point of view, it was a difficult transition to make.</s>O'BRIEN: Last month, NASA tried to launch Atlantis on three consecutive days, but each time, high winds kept the orbiter grounded. This time around, the forecast looks better. But Florida weather is no easier to predict than a Russian launch schedule. Miles O'Brien, CNN, at the Kennedy Space Center, Florida.</s>KAGAN: CNN plans to bring you live coverage of the shuttle Atlantis launch. That's set for 6:12 a.m. Eastern. That's tomorrow morning. And you'll see that here if it happens.