STS-80
Report # 36 
8 a.m. CST December 5, 1996 
 
Columbia's astronauts will spend another 24 hours in orbit after low
cloud ceilings in the vicinity of the landing site caused a wave-off
of today's landing opportunities to the Kennedy Space Center.

The Spaceflight Meteorology Group tracked the progress of a bank of
low clouds throughout the morning and finally made a "no go"
call on weather conditions on both landing opportunities this morning
as clouds continued to move toward the Shuttle Landing Facility. With
a more optimistic weather forecast for Friday, Entry Flight Director
Wayne Hale opted to forgo a landing opportunity at Edwards Air Force
Base in California this morning and try for a Friday landing in
Florida.

Tomorrow's forecast at KSC indicates that the cloud layer will clear
out behind a cold front that should pass through the area overnight,
leaving clear and dry weather in its wake.  Weather at the back-up
site in California are expected to be marginal with low clouds the
primary concern.

Columbia's five astronauts will begin a planned 8 1/2 hour sleep
period at 11:56 a.m. central today, waking up at 8:26 p.m. to prepare
for their return to Earth.  There are two landing opportunities to KSC
tomorrow.  The first opportunity would see a deorbit burn at 5:55
a.m. central with landing at 7:01 a.m., followed by an opportunity one
revolution later with a deorbit burn at 7:32 a.m. and landing at 8:38
a.m., concluding a voyage of about 6.7 million miles.  There are also
two opportunities for landing at Edwards Air Force Base, with a
deorbit burn at 7:26 a.m. for an 8:30 a.m. landing, and again at 9:01
a.m. for a 10:06 a.m. landing.

Columbia continues to circle the Earth at an altitude of 234 miles
with its systems functioning normally.


NASA Johnson Space Center Mission Status Reports and other information
are available automatically by sending an Internet electronic mail
message to jscnews-request@listserver.jsc.nasa.gov. In the body of the
message (not the subject line) users should type "subscribe" or
"unsubscribe"(no quotes). This will add or remove the email address
that sent the subscibe message to the news release distribution list.

The system will reply with a confirmation via E-mail of each subscription. 

Once you have subscribed you will receive future news releases via e-mail.