Jeff has been involved in aerospace journalism since the mid 1990s. Prior to joining Aviation Week, Jeff served as managing editor of Launchspace magazine and the International Space Industry Report. He has been the editor and chief of Aviation Week's Aerospace Daily & Defense Report since 2007 and has been a regular contributor to Aviation Week magazine. He received his B.A. from the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Va.
NASA is reassessing the International Space Station's (ISS) final configuration and hopes soon to have a better grasp of how many space shuttle flights will be necessary to complete the half-finished facility. At the last ISS heads of agency (HOA) meeting in Montreal, the partner countries agreed on a baseline final configuration that would require 28 shuttle flights and would accommodate all of the international partner modules. Eighteen would be assembly flights, with five for logistics and five for science utilization.
NASA has postponed the return-to-flight mission of the shuttle Discovery from May 15 to May 22 to ensure the program will have enough time to complete all remaining preflight reviews. "The 15th was always just a target," Shuttle Program Manager Bill Parsons told reporters during a teleconference April 20. "We always knew we were going to re-evaluate that when we got a little bit closer." The launch window will remain open until June 3.
NASA Administrator Mike Griffin told reporters April 18 that he would consider approving the launch of STS-114 over the objections of the Stafford-Covey review panel if shuttle program managers said they were confident of success.
