Posted: Thu, Nov 4, 2004, 7:49 AM ET (1249 GMT)
NASA announced late Wednesday that Thursday's scheduled launch of the DART spacecraft will be delayed because of range and space weather issues. A Pegasus XL was scheduled to launch DART late Thursday morning off the coast from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, but NASA said that "availability" of the range, along with "lingering effects of solar activity", prompted the delay. While no new launch date was announced, Spaceflight Now reported that the earliest DART could launch is November 9. DART (Demonstration of Autonomous Rendezvous Technology) is designed to rendezvous with an existing low Earth orbit satellite, MUBLCOM, using only the sensors and computers on the spacecraft itself.

Related Links:

•  Spaceflight Now launch status centerq
•  NASA press release