Endeavour heads home after shorter, successful mission

CAPE CANAVERAL (FLORIDA): NASA cleared the shuttle Endeavour for landing on Tuesday, after a two-week mission to the International Space Station (ISS) cut short 24 hours by menacing Hurricane Dean.

Landing was initially set for Wednesday, but the US space agency rescheduled it for today fearing that its control centre in Houston, Texas may have to be evacuated if it is grazed by Hurricane Dean, now roaring across the Caribbean.

The hurricane, on track to strike Mexico early on Tuesday, missing Texas altogether, "poses little hazard or little risk to the Johnson Space Centre mission control area," NASA said in yesterday a statement.

Nevertheless, it added, "mission managers continue to monitor Hurricane Dean as it moves westward."

Endeavour is to land at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, which is less well equipped than Houston for ground control operations in the event the Johson Space Centre has to be shut down if the hurricane strikes.

The Endeavour crew will have two chances to land -- at 10.02PM IST and 11.36 PM IST, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration said.

The weather forecast for today at the Cape was relatively dry and any possible showers "probably not expected to be a concern ... so the weather looks good" for a landing, said NASA spokesman Mike Curie in Houston.

Should landing here be called off, the shuttle would try again on Wednesday at Edwards Air Force Base, in California, or at the White Sands Space Harbor, in New Mexico.

The Endeavour and ISS crews finished a shortened, fourth spacewalk on Sore the shuttle with its crew of seven undocked from the ISS without performing the usual fly-past of the station to take pictures.