A commercial SpaceX supply ship loaded with NASA experiments will have to wait at least one more day to blast off into space after bad weather stopped a launch attempt early Saturday.
A drizzling pre-dawn rain and thick clouds hovered over Space X's launch pad, causing the company to postpone the Dragon delivery mission to the International Space Station for NASA until Sunday (Sept. 21), according to SPACE.com.
The Falcon 9 rocket carrying the Dragon capsule will now launch at 1:52 a.m. EDT on Sunday.
"We have scrubbed today's launch opportunity because of inclement weather," NASA spokesman Mike Curie said during the countdown commentary about a half hour before the targeted 2:14 a.m. EDT launch time on Saturday.
Click here to watch the SpaceX launch webcast live on Sunday on Space.com, thanks to NASA TV. The webcast will begin at 12:45 a.m.
On Sept. 16, SpaceX won a $2.6 billion contract to design and fly Dragon passenger ships. A test flight should take place sometime in 2016, according to Reuters. NASA also awarded Boeing a $4.2 billion contract to develop a second space taxi.
SpaceX's Falcon 9 rockets sell for about $61 million, while Boeing plans to buy Atlas 5 rockets, which cost about $150 million.
SpaceX is owned and operated by technology entrepreneur Elon Musk. The company already flies cargo to the ISS for NASA under a $1.6 billion contract and has a backlog of more than 35 commercial satellite and NASA resupply missions.
The current mission will bring up food, clothes and science gear for the station's crew. The Dragon freighter carries an experimental 3-D printer, a science instrument to monitor winds over Earth's oceans and 20 mice to be used in experiments, according to Reuters.
The forecast for Sunday shows a 40-percent chance of good launch weather for SpaceX's Falcon 9 and Dragon, said NASA weather experts. The Dragon spacecraft should arrive at the station on Tuesday (Sept. 23) and be captured by astronauts using the outpost's robotic arm.
"We're hoping the weather will be more favorable," Curie said.
So far, the company's Falcon 9 rockets have flown successfully 12 times.
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