Avatar Posted by power 550 days ago (http://www.spaceflightnow.com)
Category: Science Discovery Environment | Tags: dawn asteroid probe launch september
The scientist leading NASA's Dawn spacecraft on a three-billion-mile reconnaissance mission to explore a massive asteroid and a "dwarf planet" believed to harbor water has been designing the project for more than a decade. Liftoff was supposed to happen this weekend, yet troubles interfered. And officials Saturday ordered another launch delay -- all the way to September.

Chris Russell, professor of geophysics and space physics at the UCLA, first proposed the mission in 1994. He's been waiting a long time to see the robotic probe, powered by exotic ion thrusters, travel into the asteroid belt where it will orbit the rocky body Vesta, then venture out further to the small world called Ceres and also orbit that tantilizing object.

But getting the spacecraft built and launched has been beleaguered by setbacks.

"The spacecraft will spend much less time in space than we put in preparing for the mission," Russell said recently. "I want to get this spacecraft up in space, where it belongs. I'm really confident about the spacecraft. We've been testing and retesting."
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