NASA said it has decided to postpone the launch of a German-chartered science research space mission until March to replace faulty engine pumps on the shuttle Columbia.
The space agency added that the two other NASA shuttles, Discovery and Endeavour, would be inspected for the same problem and also may have their turbopumps replaced.Liftoff in the nine-day flight for the German-chartered mission had been tentatively set for Feb. 25, but "early March is the best we can do," said Dick Young, a National Aeronautics and Space Administration spokesman in Florida.
The Columbia mission was chartered by the German space agency for $150 million to conduct a variety of medical and science experiments, including tests of a prototype robot, ultraviolet observations of the Milky Way and physics research.
The mission, which will cost NASA an estimated $500 million, would be the second time in 12 years that science work had been directed by a non-American space agency. A payload command center has been established near Munich to control scientific work aboard the shuttle.
NASA said in a statement that it delayed the mission because of concerns about seals that control the flow of gas around turbine blades in the high-pressure oxygen turbopumps of all three of Columbia's main engines.