Cape Canaveral: Nasa Finally Wins One

Nasa Finally Wins One

For a change, the mood at the Kennedy Space Center was upbeat last Friday as a ; Delta rocket carrying a secret military payload for the Star Wars space defense program lifted off flawlessly at 11:08 a.m. "We feel we are back in the groove," said NASA's Delta project manager William Russell. The flight was Delta's first since a rocket was destroyed after lift-off in May. And it was only the second successful major U.S. launch of any kind in six attempts, starting with January's space shuttle Challenger disaster.

The rocket reportedly carried two satellites on a dual-purpose mission: to detect...

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